Author's Note: sorry this is so short, but I've put two up this time to
make up for it. Please read and review - any sort of feedback is really
helpful.
A week or so after their first successful prank of the year, Peter produced a Muggle camera. He'd been bought it during the holidays as a present from a Squib cousin and had completely forgotten about it - why should he use a Muggle camera when wizard portraits are so much more interesting for everyone?
"I've got it," he said miserably. "But I don't think I even know how to work it, let alone get proper pictures from it. Do any of you guys know, by any chance?" Harry laughed.
"Here, I'll show you. Open the shutter thing, look through there and press the button. Have a go, James and I will pose for you."
They had great fun taking the pictures, the wizard boys absolutely fascinated by the mechanics of the camera, and took a good number of them in groups and individual ones. This lasted for about five days before they got bored of it.
"What do we do now, Harry?" James asked. "Don't we have to treat them before they're any good?" For a wizard boy with no Muggle relatives at all, he was remarkably well informed.
"Yes," replied Harry. "But I'm not sure how to do it. Muggles take them to shops to have it done, so I've never done it. I have an idea about where we could try though. It's called the Room of Requirement - I'll take you to the corridor, and it'll hopefully appear if we think hard enough about needing all the stuff. I read about it in a book about Hogwarts that I found in my old school's library," Harry added, hoping that that would explain his knowledge. "If we do it right, it'll turn up with everything we need, and instructions on everything that we need to do."
He took them up to the corridor that evening, and sure enough the elusive room appeared for them. Harry had found that there was a knack to it, and all of the DA sessions had given him plenty of practice. Inside they found trays of liquid and a number of instruction booklets with illustrations telling them what to do and how to get the best possible results. It was, needless to say, a very messy process when carried out by five teenage boys who'd never done anything of the sort before, but they managed.
"Why haven't we found this room before?" James asked the world at large. "It's brilliant! Did you say that it comes up with whatever you need?"
"Yes."
"It was a great idea coming here, by the way. I could see the others getting a bit stressy if we tried it in the common room, or in the dormitory."
"Yeah, well I don't think many people know about it, and because its not always here, it wouldn't show up on any map or diagram that you made. It would be pretty hard to make a Map of Hogwarts anyway, because it's unplottable, but it would be impossible to get this room on. I think the house elves know about it though, and I bet that Dumbledore does. I don't think there's much he misses around here."
"You're probably right. He never seems surprised by any of our pranks any more, even when he obviously finds them funny, and if we try something on the staff, we're waylaid by him before we even get started and put to doing some chore."
"Here's the first picture!" Peter exclaimed. "It's the one of Harry, and look, he's pulling faces at us!"
"Harry!" Remus said, pretending to be shocked. "What Lily would think I really don't know. It might put her off the lot of us for life. We'd better not show her."
"I wasn't intending to," James said with feeling. "At least, none of the ones of me."
A week or so after their first successful prank of the year, Peter produced a Muggle camera. He'd been bought it during the holidays as a present from a Squib cousin and had completely forgotten about it - why should he use a Muggle camera when wizard portraits are so much more interesting for everyone?
"I've got it," he said miserably. "But I don't think I even know how to work it, let alone get proper pictures from it. Do any of you guys know, by any chance?" Harry laughed.
"Here, I'll show you. Open the shutter thing, look through there and press the button. Have a go, James and I will pose for you."
They had great fun taking the pictures, the wizard boys absolutely fascinated by the mechanics of the camera, and took a good number of them in groups and individual ones. This lasted for about five days before they got bored of it.
"What do we do now, Harry?" James asked. "Don't we have to treat them before they're any good?" For a wizard boy with no Muggle relatives at all, he was remarkably well informed.
"Yes," replied Harry. "But I'm not sure how to do it. Muggles take them to shops to have it done, so I've never done it. I have an idea about where we could try though. It's called the Room of Requirement - I'll take you to the corridor, and it'll hopefully appear if we think hard enough about needing all the stuff. I read about it in a book about Hogwarts that I found in my old school's library," Harry added, hoping that that would explain his knowledge. "If we do it right, it'll turn up with everything we need, and instructions on everything that we need to do."
He took them up to the corridor that evening, and sure enough the elusive room appeared for them. Harry had found that there was a knack to it, and all of the DA sessions had given him plenty of practice. Inside they found trays of liquid and a number of instruction booklets with illustrations telling them what to do and how to get the best possible results. It was, needless to say, a very messy process when carried out by five teenage boys who'd never done anything of the sort before, but they managed.
"Why haven't we found this room before?" James asked the world at large. "It's brilliant! Did you say that it comes up with whatever you need?"
"Yes."
"It was a great idea coming here, by the way. I could see the others getting a bit stressy if we tried it in the common room, or in the dormitory."
"Yeah, well I don't think many people know about it, and because its not always here, it wouldn't show up on any map or diagram that you made. It would be pretty hard to make a Map of Hogwarts anyway, because it's unplottable, but it would be impossible to get this room on. I think the house elves know about it though, and I bet that Dumbledore does. I don't think there's much he misses around here."
"You're probably right. He never seems surprised by any of our pranks any more, even when he obviously finds them funny, and if we try something on the staff, we're waylaid by him before we even get started and put to doing some chore."
"Here's the first picture!" Peter exclaimed. "It's the one of Harry, and look, he's pulling faces at us!"
"Harry!" Remus said, pretending to be shocked. "What Lily would think I really don't know. It might put her off the lot of us for life. We'd better not show her."
"I wasn't intending to," James said with feeling. "At least, none of the ones of me."