The Marauders Tale: Year 1



Disclaimer: Again, I own nothing, it all belongs to J. K. and her fabulous mind. Also...keep reviewing, people!!!

Chapter 3- Enter the Marauders... and Classes

When James woke the next morning, he found the dormitory nearly empty. Only Peter was still asleep, curled up into a small ball at the edge of his bed.

He stood quietly and changed into a fresh set of clothing, including robes, and stealthily headed for the common room. Sirius and Lupin were already down there, amid a few other groups, and they seemed to be deep in conversation, bent over small sheets of parchment.

"Defense Against the Dark Arts is first," he heard Lupin mutter as he got nearer. "Then Double Potions with Hufflepuff...I don't know about that, Potions was always my father's worst subject and anything I tried to read on the subject just slipped out of my head."

"Don't worry about it, Brainiac," Sirius told him, cheerful as ever. "What's after that?"

"Herbology, Greenhouse One...then lunch, and a break...Transfiguration's the last class of the day."

"Ah, good. All the best classes for pranks." Sirius stretched leisurely in his seat, stretching his head back so he could see behind himself. "Oh, James. about time you woke up, mate, thought we'd have to drop a load of Dungbombs on your head to wake you for DADA."

"DADA?" James asked, tousling his black locks.

"Yeah. Defense Against the Dark Arts." Sirius grinned. "First class of the day you know, with Professor Becker."

"How's she?" James asked, at a loss as to who most of the teachers even were.

"He," Sirius corrected witheringly. "And he's supposed to be a really good teacher, a little strict, but according to my uncle (well, the one that's actually human enough to talk to), he was a great prankster in his day, really knew his stuff. Should be interesting to talk to."

"Oh." James let his hand drop from his hair as a very pretty girl with long red hair walked across his field of vision. "Who's that?"

"Who now?" Sirius swiveled in his seat. His eyes locked on the girl and he smiled broadly. "Oh, I see. Ickle Jamesy's got himself a wittle crush!"

Lupin looked up with a grin. "Speaking of crushes, I think you'll have some problems shaking that Peter kid off your tail, James. He didn't fall asleep for at least three hours last night, I heard him babbling away about how great you are when I woke up to go to the lavatory. Have you noticed how persistent he is?"

"Unfortunately," James replied, suddenly sullen.

"And how he always talks in either exclamations or questions?" Lupin shook his head ruefully. "Does the boy have a normal tone of voice?"

Sirius broke into giggles. "He's like a little puppy!"

"Yeah." James forced a smile before dragging the subject back to the mystery girl. "But who is she?"

"Woah, won't let it go, will he?" Sirius looked up at his friend. "Love at first sight, is it?"

"No!" James cried, a bit too loudly. He lowered his voice. "I mean, I'm just curious, that's all..."

"Right." Lupin stood up. "Should we go down to the Hall to get a spot of breakfast, then?"

"Yeah," James said quickly, watching as the girl left the common room. "Yeah, I'm hungry."

"And you want to follow your girlfriend." Sirius raised his eyebrows as he too got up from the couch. "And maybe ditch old Petey too, eh?"

"Hungry," James repeated in what he hoped was a bored tone of voice. "When I'm hungry, I eat. Dunno what you do..."

"Cute, Potter, real cute." Smirking, Sirius led the way out of the common room. Just outside the portrait hole, he paused and looked hopelessly from side to side. "Where to now, do you suppose?"

"Follow the crowds," Lupin suggested. "It's early enough that most of them are due for breakfast anyway."

He took his own advice and slipped into the throng. Sirius and James shrugged, then followed him.

Lupin had been right; the large group of students had indeed been headed for the Great Hall. They boys shoved their way in and each grabbed some toast and a handful of bacon before slipping quietly out again...or so they tried.

Unfortunately, Peter chose that precise moment to run right into Lupin and knock him unceremoniously to the ground.

"Ow," Lupin muttered, rubbing his head gingerly in the place where it had slammed into the ground with an angry smacking sound. He glared up at Peter, who couldn't have looked less horror-struck at his mistake. In fact, Lupin found himself thinking angrily, the little snot was probably berating himself for not plowing into James.

"Sorry Remus," Peter said, still looking anything but. "But I thought you lot would like to know that Defense Against the Dark Arts is starting in a few minutes and Professor Becker hates when people show up late...my cousin told me," he added hastily as Sirius opened his mouth to ask how he would know the professor already. "C'mon James," Peter continued, grasping James' arm and tugging him in what the boy could only hope was the direction to the correct classroom. "I know the way."

"Do you now?" Lupin muttered, still rubbing his head as he climbed to his feet.

"Little suck-up," Sirius grumbled. "He better not end up double-crossing us."

Lupin miraculously became sympathetic toward the annoying little punk. "He won't. He wants to be friends, that's all. Probably doesn't have any other ones."

"He keeps getting on my nerves, he won't have these ones either," Sirius said furiously. "I'll make sure of that."

"Maybe we should get to class," Lupin insisted, pulling on the back of Sirius' robes. "We don't want to be late."

"Speak for yourself," Sirius growled, but quickly followed his shorter friend.

They ducked through the door to the DADA classroom just before the professor waved his wand at it and made the door slam shut. Creeping into their seats, Lupin and Sirius looked over at James, who was being pestered once again by Peter. Ignoring the little guy, James was staring dazedly at the red-head from earlier.

Professor Becker tapped his wand several times on his desk and cleared his throat softly. He had dark blond hair, almost brown, and it was tugged into a small ponytail that made him look oddly young and cool. His ice-blue eyes roamed over the first years before him as though sizing up how much trouble they could get into while in his class.

Stopping on Sirius, he allowed a faint, but boyishly eager, smile to cross his 40-something face. "Mr. Black?" he asked. "Related to Johnson Black?"

Sirius nodded, still slumped casually in his chair. "He's my favorite uncle."

Becker said nothing in response, but his smile was far-away.

The red haired girl that had unwittingly become the object of James' affection raised her hand tentatively. "Um, sir? Do we need our books for this lesson?"

The teacher seemed to snap out of a reverie that Lupin was sure related to his old pranking days. "Uh...Miss....Evans. Lily, yes? Yes, books are a necessity today, but starting next lesson, you won't be needing them for much outside of homework...not that I'm promising absolutely no bookwork, of course." He winked and Lily smiled back.

James breathed, "Lily..." as if it were the most perfect name he'd ever heard in his short life. Sirius rolled his eyes.

"Don't keel over now, mate," he grumbled. "It's just a lousy name."

James looked like he was tempted to slug Sirius then and there for saying something bad against Lily Evans, the girl whom he was sure had been made for him. Lupin jabbed the dark-haired boy in the arm with his wand and accidentally set James' sleeve aflame.

James yipped in surprise and Professor Becker glanced over, raising his eyebrows.

"Problems, Mr. Potter?" he asked good-naturedly.

Lupin, blushing furiously at his mistake, muttered something and James' robe sleeve was drenched in water.

James glared at Lupin and Sirus now, fully aware that the class, including Lily, was staring at him. Underneath the anger, however, rested a sort of pride. She's looking at me!

"If you're all quite finished," Becker said loudly, recapturing the attention of his class, "then I'd like to go back to the original purpose of this class."

"Which was?" Sirius muttered. Lupin shot him a look.

"I thought you liked Becker," he murmured softly.

Sirius shrugged. "Gotta keep up an image; if word got out that I liked this teacher, I might be expected to like all of `em."

Lupin frowned. Sirius' logic made absolutely no sense to him, but then again, he'd always taken quickly to school and learning new things. Perhaps Sirius wasn't like that.

Class ended quickly and the boys slipped out into the hall, then looked around in pursuit of their next class. They found it in a dungeon beneath the rest of the school, an area that was dark, dank, and smelled rotten. Peter automatically swooned as though he were ill and, naturally, Sirius mimicked him just for the fun of it.

The professor, McKinnans, was not a lovely man. In fact, he seemed indifferent to the world and when he spoke, it was in a high scratchy voice that killed James' ears and made Peter fall out of his desk when he first heard it.

If the professor was bad, however, the class was terrible. Not half the class had passed when Sirius' potion exploded in his face and gave him large boils on his nose, Lupin's lava stars escaped and lit several Hufflepuff's robes on fire, and Peter knocked over his cauldron, melting the table legs.

By the time the bell rang, at least four students, including poor Sirius, had been sent to the hospital wing. As the rest of the class left the room, James thought he heard McKinnans mutter, "Every year...Good Lord, why do I try to get them to concoct potions on the first day of class every year??"

Herbology, with Professor Jones, was incredibly easy to find and a refreshing change from the horrible dungeons. For one thing, it was in the fresh air. For another, Jones, a thin stick of a woman, didn't give them anything difficult to do.

"It's only the first day," she informed them. "There will plenty of time over the year for you to learn about the different herbs and plants. Today, I just want you to acquaint yourselves with some of the things in this greenhouse. Less dangerous things," she added swiftly as a round boy whose name James hadn't yet caught poked curiously at a plant that looked suspiciously like it had teeth.

James and Peter followed Lupin to the far corner of the greenhouse where a tall, bent plant stood on a shelf.

"What is it?" Peter asked, tugging annoyingly on Lupin's robes.

"I'm not sure." Lupin gently pushed the shorter boy away and looked more closely at the flower. "I haven't really looked at the book for this class in depth yet..."

James wasn't interested. "When do you think Sirius'll be back?" he asked quietly.

Lupin shrugged. "Probably soon. Those boils couldn't have been that intense, could they?"

As if on cue, the door swung open, but it wasn't Sirius entering. Instead, the large shaggy Hagid stepped through, shoulders hunched.

"'ello," he said cheerfully. "Er..Professor? Could I have a word?"

Jones looked up. "Of course, Hagrid. What is it?"

"Got that plant yeh wanted," he told her proudly.

Her face lit up. "Good, good. Set it in Greenhouse Three, please, Hagrid. Against the back wall, if you will."

He nodded. "O'course."

James frowned as Hagrid left, bumping his shoulder on the door-frame as he went. "What's the big secret?"

Lupin shrugged again. "Teacher stuff?"

The bell rang then, signaling the end of class, and the Gryffindors went back up to the castle for lunch.

Sirius didn't reappear until the other Marauders were back in the common room for break, but when he burst through the portrait hole, he was grinning.

"What's up?" James inquired. "You're looking all doofy."

Sirius shook his head and motioned for the others to follow him to their room. When they got up there, he slammed the door shut and said quietly, "Guess what?"

The boys leaned eagerly forward. "What is it?"

Sirius' smile never wavered. "Rumor has it, we got ourselves something really wild at Hogwarts."

James raised his eyebrows. "Which is?"

Sirius lowered his voice dramatically. "A werewolf."

"Wow!" James fairly yelled. Peter squeaked and stumbled back to sit on his bed. Lupin grew stony-faced.

"So?" he asked coldly.

"So??" Sirius looked at the other boy as if he were mad. "So, we could add him to the team if we found out who he was! We could have a blast! He'd be able to help us with all sorts of pranks!!"

"Where did you hear this?" James demanded, cutting Lupin off.

"When I was in the hospital wing I heard Dumbledore talking to Flitwick about one of the students. He was saying stuff about..." Sirius suddenly frowned. "Well, I'm not actually sure about what he said because Madame Pomfrey was spreading some nasty smelling stuff all over my face and I went temporarily deaf from the odor." He made a face. "That was nasty."

"Focus, Sirius," James barked. "The werewolf, who is he?"

"Didn't I just say I have no idea who he is?" Sirius pried his friend's fingers off his robes. "But we can find him."

"How?" Lupin asked, still oddly cold. "Are we going to go around asking everyone if they turn into something mad and hairy once a month?"

"Not a bad idea, Remy," James mused, nodding his head. "Of course, we can't be that obvious; the teachers would notice and silence us. But if we go around, checking to see who disappears the night of the full moon and such, we could find our guy really easily."

Sirius ruffled James' unkempt hair. "Sounds like a plan." He rubbed his hands together. "At the next full moon, we put our plan into action!"