Chapter 6: The First Prank

After lunch they had to sit through History of Magic class which James and Sirius officially labeled "a snooze fest."

"Honestly, Sirius it wasn't that bad," Remus stated on their way back to the Great Hall for supper.

"Not that bad? What class were you sitting in?" Sirius asked, Remus rolled his eyes and pushed open the heavy wooden door.

They quickly ended this conversation as the teacher of History of Magic, Professor Binns, was sitting at the staff table and looking in their direction. The boys slid onto the bench in what had become their usual order- James, Sirius Remus, and Peter.

"James, I really want to put our plan into action. I was thinking…" Sirius said nearly bouncing up and down in his seat.

James cut Sirius off with a fast hand motion as Lily and her friends came up behind them.

"Hi," she said motioning for her two friends to take seats next to her, across from the four boys. "What are you guys talking about?"

"Uhh…." James was usually good at making up stories but was now drawing a blank.

Remus noticed this and quickly stepped in, "We were just discussing the… er, incident in Potions today.

James looked up at Remus and mouthed "thanks" before turning back to Lily. At the mention of the potions class her face had gone from cheerful to livid.

"I stand that pathetic excuse for a teacher. Bloody bugger!"

The group burst into loud laughter, causing everyone at the staff table and most of the students to and stare at them. Dumbledore smiled at the jolly group and turned back to the professor he was talking to.

"Enjoy yourselves now boys, because I'm going to make your futures hell," Snape muttered to Lucius across the hall. Lucius snickered.

The group finished their meal delving themselves in lighted conversation.

"So what's all this about a plan?" Remus shouted more excitedly then they had ever seen him, as soon as they were back in their room.

"Well, I'll tell you if you promise not to wet yourself," laughed Sirius.

Remus gave him a stern look and was about to say something when Peter jumped in.

"Come on, tell us!" he said bouncing off his bed.

"Well, it was mostly my idea," James cleared his throat loudly when Sirius said this. "With James' help." he quickly added.

"Anyway," all attention turned to James, "Sirius and I came up with a… practical joke if you will, to show Hogwarts what having James Potter and Sirius Black, and now you guys of course, really means." James said this so evilly it startled even Sirius.

"OK…" Remus regained the courage to speak, "what exactly does this plan entail?"

James' smile spread across his face. "That's the fun part."

Everyone was sitting peacefully in the grounds, enjoying the warm Saturday afternoon. Lily and her friends were sitting by the lake talking and laughing and occasionally kicking water at each other. The quiet atmosphere was broken by a loud bang inside the castle.

"Peter, be careful!" Remus scolded. "These things are really dangerous!"

They realized exactly what he meant when the "fire-cracker" Peter had dropped flew back towards them, just missing Sirius, and exploded with a tremendous noise.

This immediantly attracted the attention of all the students outside, the professors, and Dumbledore.

For a moment, all who were outside just stared blankly at the castle. Suddenly, every young witch and wizard were stampeding toward the Entrance Hall, each trying to be the first to see what was going on.

In all the commotion, no one noticed the Firewhistle, including Lily who started to get up and follow the others but was pushed backwards into the lake when it exploded.

This wouldn't have been such a big deal, had she known how to swim.

"Run!" James dropped the box of dung bombs he was carrying (not his first choice).

Sirius, also seeing that there was no way this could not end well, dropped his box and dashed out of the room.

Remus and Peter threw the things they were holding and followed them.

"What do we do?" Remus panted.

"Don't know," Sirius said quickly, still running.

Just then something went off… in fact nearly everything went off, all at once. The boys all turned, still running, and would have kept running had they not run right into someone- Severus Snape.

Lily struggled to reach the surfaced and grasp the still-shaking ground. Suddenly, she felt something solid come under his fingertips. She found herself lying on the grass and coughed up the water she had swallowed.

"I knew you must be involved in such a stupid excuse for a prank. Pity these things couldn't have been used by someone with talent who could have actually done something interesting with them," Snape said picking up the shell of a wizard cracker that had been in one of the boxes.

"Out of our way, Snivellus!" Sirius shouted, realizing that the teachers would be after them in a moment.

"Oh, do da babies wanna go hide in Gryffindor tower away from the scary teachers?" Severus asked in a mock-baby voice. "You're pathetic."

Remus could hear footsteps coming closer, up the staircase. "Severus, please this is ridiculous. If you don't let us by you'll just get into trouble too."

"Oh, I don't think that will happen, Lupin," Snape spat, "not after I tell the professors what I caught you doing."

"You didn't catch us doing ANYTHING!" Sirius screamed raising his wand to Severus' head, Serverus quickly whipped out his own wand out of his pocket. "Remus, quick, what's the memory charm?" Sirius asked his voice shaking more than he meant it to.

"Sirius, calm down we can't…" he was cut off by a cold, deep voice that made a chill go up his spine.

"What's going on here?" the Potion's professor asked oh-too-casually. They turned to see he was accompanied by Professor McGonagall, who could only gape at the scene, and Dumbledore who was wearing a look between disappointment and laughter.

"They were about to nearly blow up the school and erase my memory before you came along," Snape explained calmly to the professors, giving the other boys an evil glance.

"You little…" Sirius shouted and started to run towards him but was restrained by James and Remus. Peter was standing behind them shivering under the teachers' glares.

Just as Sirius was starting to slip from James' and Remus' grip all their attentions were turned were to another explosion in the hallway.

"Wha-what happened here?" McGonagall asked still unable to absorb what was happening in front of her.

"Well, it's obvious isn't it?" the Potion's professor snapped. "Potter and his little friends here," his glare moved from James to Sirius to Remus to Peter, who shivered once again, "must have been trying to pull some sort of prank when Serverus bravely stepped in and stopped them from blowing up the entire castle.

Dumbledore chuckled, "Now, now, Alexander, I'm sure these boys couldn't have meant to cause such a raucous."

The boys exchanged confused looks.

"Do you mean to say, Headmaster, that you are not going to punish them at all?" Breaker sneered.

Well, I do believe a detention is in order," Dumbledore said, taking a slightly firmer tone.

Breaker smiled and turned back to the four boys. "It will be in my classroom tomorrow night at seven o'clock sharp. Do not be late," he turned to leave when McGonagall spoke up.

"I think I shall attend as well, Alexander, if you don't mind."

Breaker frowned disgustedly and proceeded towards the dungeons.

"Mr. Snape, you are free to go about your day. You boys," Dumbledore pointed to the four pranksters, "follow me."

Lily rubbed her blood-shot eyes until the image of the castle came into focus. The grounds were now completely empty except for Elizabeth and Teresa, who were bending over Lily with concerned looks on their faces.

"Lily, Lily, are you OK?" Elizabeth asked, her voice shaking.

Lily spit out the rest of the water in her mouth and answered, "Yeah, yeah, I'm fine." Teresa pulled her up and helped steady her.

"Guess we should go back up to the castle, everyone else has." Teresa reasoned.

"Yeah, I'd quite like to find the bugger who was responsible for that little incident. And when I do…" Lily shook her fist angrily.

The other girls giggled. "Wow I almost feel sorry for whoever it is… they're going to have to feel the wrath of Lily Evans now," Elizabeth laughed.

Dumbledore closed the large wooden door and walked over to his desk. The four boys gave him an ashamed look before fascinating themselves with the patterns on their shoes. Dumbledore cleared his throat loudly and the boys immediately snapped their attention back to the older man's face.

"You must know that I do not condone your behavior today," Dumbledore began.

"Sir, we didn't mean to…, our intentions were never…, it wasn't supposed to…" Remus shook nervously as he tried to explain what happened to the professor.

"Remus, my boy, you can't think I truly believe everything Mr. Snape was accusing you of," Dumbledore said.

The boys now looked at him with a genuine look of surprise.

"But, sir…" James was a bit confused by the headmaster's statement.

"James, I have no doubt that what you did mean to do today was no where near the extremity that Serverus claimed, but I also have no doubt that what you meant to do was completely inside the boundaries of the rules," Dumbledore explained.

The pranksters looked again at the floor.

"James, Sirius, Remus, Peter," he nodded to each of the boys in turn, "you do deserve the detention you will be attending tomorrow evening, however, I don't suspect this will be the last time we meet in my office this year." The professor winked and muttered a simple spell to open the door and gestured for them to leave.

"Goodbye professor," Sirius muttered.

"Goodbye boys, and Sirius…"

Sirius turned back to headmaster.

"Don't let the natural Black temper get you into more trouble then your curiosity already will."

Sirius gave the professor another confused look before following his friends out of the office.

"Well, our prank didn't go exactly how we wanted it to, but out punishment isn't too bad," Remus reasoned.

"I suppose so," Peter squeaked.

"We'll just consider it a learning experience, after all, there's always tomorrow," James said with that mischievous glint in his eye.

"Tomorrow? That doesn't exactly give us a lot of time to plan, or get supplies or…" Remus' logical shut down of James' plan was interrupted by the loud, angry footsteps of someone coming down the hall.

"Lily! What happened? Why are you all wet?" James asked concerned.

"James Potter! You and your stupid pranks and ah! I nearly drown because of you, Potter!" Lily screamed, dripping wet, the puddle of water about her feet growing.

"Drown? Lily, we never meant to…"

"Oh, shut it James. You are nothing more than a… marauder!" Lily yelled.

"Marauder?" James raised an eyebrow, "I quite like that term."

"Oh! You're just a stupid boy!" Lily stomped off.

By this point James had completely lost sight of the fact that he had just been yelled at and insulted.

"Well boys, what do you think? Shall we be The Marauders?" James asked smiling widely.

And that is start of the pranks… and Lily's hatred toward James. I figured the Marauders' first prank couldn't be successful, especially since they had come up with their name yet. I also liked the idea of Lily being the one to come up with "Marauders" of course she hadn't meant for them to take it like that but oh well.

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