Just Kids
A Marauders Fic
Summary
Their lives will shape the fate of the world, magic and muggle. They will help drive back the darkness, their names will be known to everyone; they will be loved and hated in turn. Not quite yet though, right now…they're just kids.
Disclaimer
You are gullible if you believe the following:
That the word gullible has been taken out of the dictionary.
&
That I am our beloved JKR. I'm not; I don't own the rights to the Harry Potter books or any of the characters in them. I am not making any money out of this so please don't sue. Since I don't have much money you wouldn't get much out of me anyway.
Authors Note
Happy belated New Year to all my lovely reviewers, unfortunately my holiday spirit is dampened slightly by the fact that I am due to return to school on Thursday and I haven't done my Chemistry evaluation that is due in for Friday. School…
Any way enjoy this chapter while I slave away, see you!
It's Just Another Manic Monday
Peter was lost and he wasn't quite sure how it had happened; he had been following the others down to breakfast, when Peeves the Poltergeist had shown up in the form of an enormous suit of armour and started chasing them with an axe the size of a, a, a very big axe. Surprisingly enough the sheer terror he had, very sensibly felt was only shared by "that idiot boy who wanted to be in Huffelpuff" Merridock; Remus Lupin hadn't even seemed to realise the danger an extremely sharp axe posed to him and James and Black had treated it as a) a huge joke and b) a chance to cause serious bodily harm to the other boy.
Eventually of course they had started to run, insulting Peeves and trying to lure him towards the other boy at the same time but still running; Remus Lupin however had been so fascinated by the whole concept of poltergeist activity that the much realer concept of "There is a big axe that is going to chop your head off" hadn't quite registered. James and Black had had to run back to save him, now this was great…until they remembered their position as mortal enemies.
Looking back on what had happened from the relative safety of the corridor it had been very funny; the two boys had engaged in a kind of tug-of-war using Remus as the rope, shouting, running and dodging the wild swings Peeves was making with the axe all the while. Their rather hilarious situation had come to its comical conclusion when they reached a crossroads; instead of following Peter and Merridock (who had run straight on until they had collapsed by the statue of a wizened old wizard) they had turned and tried to run in the opposite direction to the boy on the other end of the trio. This had resulted in a moment of tension during which each boy had strained to reassert control over the group, Remus' arms had looked like they might pop out of their sockets and a pained expression had appeared on his face. The struggle for supremacy had ended quite quickly when the axe Peeves had been wielding with such ferocity found its target, Remus' head.
It was fortunate, thought Peter that the axe had been made out of rubber, so the only injuries the trio had sustained were bumps and bruises from their sudden contact with the stone floor after the surprise of being hit by a rubber axe had rendered Remus incapable of remaining on his feet. Peter had been quite startled himself, the Merridock and him had been running back shouting warnings when Peeves had struck and in the excitement of Remus not becoming something resembling a banana split he had tripped and hit his head.
Thus the only two things he remembered about the chaos that followed was Black swearing a lot and Severus Snape, the hook nosed kid Remus had saved him from turning up shouting something about informing the teachers. Peter presumed that they had split of after that because he came to his senses alone in some corridor he had never seen before in his life.
Peter considered this to be just his luck, the rest of the school was probably stuffing their faces with breakfast at this very moment and he was going to miss it because of some stupid pretend ghost. Admittedly before Peeves had arrived they had been lost, due to James' need to be independent from the older years and his desperate wish to impress Lily Evens with his bravery.
The feast last night had been made very entertaining because of this want; between shooting dark glares at Remus and Black chatting away he had attempted to engage Lily in witty conversation. Despite what Tanya Jynx had said Peter firmly believed that James had deliberately made a colossal fool of himself to entertain the table; how could someone so brilliant and funny go to pieces over some girl that didn't even like him. It was beyond Peter.
The thought that Peeves interruption probably hadn't made a difference to the time taken to get to breakfast consoled Peter somewhat, but not much, being lost together is much better then being lost by yourself.
He found the Great Hall after he ran through a headless horseman, who agreed to direct him to the Hall after Peter promised to find and burn a polo ball for him.
Peter rejoined his friends at the Gryffindor table, he was just about to tell them about the promise he had made to the ghost and too pled for their help with his quest to find a polo ball, whatever that was, when the post arrived. Since a whole flock of owls arriving at once tends to distract the most avid of listeners and Peter had to admit that James seemed to be more interested in his porridge-with-honey then in his friend's story, he decided to keep quiet until they had gone away.
Idly he stared up at the owls, wondering whether his mum would be sending him anything and hoping that she hadn't sent him that "jumper" (in Peter's opinion it couldn't be called a jumper, his Aunt May had made for him and she couldn't knit any thing that didn't look like it was made for a rather large octopus with two heads) that he had taken out of his trunk and hidden in a pot plant at the back of the garden shed. It would probably arrive with a note saying something like…
"Darling, I hope you are settling in nicely. I found this last night in the strangest place, Merlin knows how it got there but I thought I better send it to you since you like Aunty May's jumpers so much and they are very good for keeping out the cold.
Love Mummy"
Yes, that would be something she would do, send him something that would embarrass him in front of the whole table and honestly believe that he would be glad to have it with him.
Thankfully his mum's barn owl didn't appear with a very lumpy package in fact it didn't appear at all, in a way Peter was disappointed at least the jumper would have showed she cared instead there was nothing, even Black was getting more letters then him.
In fact Black was getting more owls then anyone else in the school and he didn't look to happy about it.
"James, why do you think Blacks getting all that mail?" Peter asked James
"Don't know, don't care but I hope someone's sent him some Wartcap Powder or something like that." He answered transferring his frown from the offending boy to his porridge.
"I think someone might have…"
"What, really!" James looked much happier all of a sudden and began looking wildly around as if the culprit would be holding up a sign saying "I send people nasty things".
"It's just the Slytherins seem really interested in him and his letters, they keep pointing at him then laughing their heads off." James sneaked a discreet look over his shoulder at the Slytherin table.
"I wouldn't say that smirking a lot and looking in his direction counts as pointing and howling with laughter but, yeah, they certainly seem to be doing a lot of whatever it is they're doing." He considered the problem while finishing his porridge and Peter followed James' example by continuing with his scrambled eggs on toast.
Their peaceful meal was interrupted when a large tawny owl with a disdainful expression dropped yet another letter on Blacks plate. Besides noting the passage of the owl over his head Peter gave it not thought but James saw something else…
"Peter look, Black's got a Howler!" Peter barely had time to cover his ears before the piercing shrieks of a woman that must have been Blacks mother filled the Great Hall.
"GRYFFINDOR! GRYFFINDOR! FILTHY CHILD, HOW COULD YOU DISGRACE AND BESPOIL THE NAME OF YOUR ANCESTORS. SHAME OF MY FLESH. MISERABLE LITTLE CREATURE CONSORTING WITH FILTH AND CREATURES LOWER THEN VERMIN, MUDBLOODS THE LOT OF THEM. YOU ARE A WORTHLESS PIECE OF DRAGON DUNG, DELIBERATLY DEFYING EVERYTHING WE HAVE TAUGHT YOU, EVERY THING THAT YOU SHOULD BE FOR THE FALSE LIES THAT BLOOD TRAITORS LIKE DUMBELDORE EDIFY. YOUR FATHER IS WRITING TO COMPLAIN AND YOU ARE TO BEG FOR IMMEDIATE RE-SORTMENT INTO SLYTHERIN OR BELIEVE ME WE WILL MAKE YOU. IT WAS A MISTAKE NOT TO SEND YOU TO DURMSTRANG AND WE WILL RECTIFY THAT IF NEED BE. THAT SCHOOL HAS GONE TO THE FLOBBERWORMS UNDER THAT DECREPID, MUDBLOOD LOVING BLOOD TRAITOR; HE IGNORES ALL THE OLD WAYS AND DISCREDITS THOSE WHO DON'T WITH FOUL SLANDER. IF YOU DARE GO DOWN THAT ROUTE YOUR PATHETIC LITTLE LIFE WILL NOT BE WORTH LIVING, I WILL MAKE SURE OF IT. REMEMBER ONE WRONG STEP AND YOU WILL BE COMING BACK HOME FASTER THEN YOU CAN SAY SLYTHERIN, NOT THAT YOU WOULD, ABOMINATION UPON YOUR FAMILY. ALSO, DON'T EVEN TRY TO WEASEL OUT OF COMING HOME THIS HOLIDAY REVOLTING INSIGNIFICANT MUDBLOOD LOVING WASTE OF SPACE THAT YOU ARE, YOU AND I NEED TO HAVE A LITTLE TALK."
The Great Hall echoed with the Black woman's screams as the bright red envelope exploded and crumbled to dust under the intense stares of almost the entire population of Hogwarts. Black however seemed unaware if this, his expression was blank or at least unreadable as he sat their but even Peter from his position half a table away could see him shaking. A few shouts of laughter from the Slitherin's side of the room fell like stones in to a pool of silence so deep that even laughter, the great icebreaker couldn't disturb the tension surrounding Black and the smouldering remains of his letter.
Shout Outs
Amalynne O'hara: I'm blushing, what a great review, I do like my "Understated humour" and am always glad when people notice it, half the time they don't though, I was really pleased with James' story about his dad and the car and no one picked up on it. Ah well. How can you prefer Quod to Quiditch I mean come one interesting idea but nothing to the excitement of Quiditch to quote Ron "What's so exciting about a sport with only one ball" (this is a joke by the way) but seriously Quiditch so much better. Have I reviewed the next chapter of your story? My small brain cannot cope with all this demand for my reviews.
Woodland-Dew: I agree with every thing you said in your brutally truthful review. One of the reasons not much is happening is because I do quite short chapters where I focus on one event and I add this to that event to reach my deadline of 1000 words so quite often not much happens; does that make any sense to you? I tried to give this chapter a slight cliff-hanger review and tell me what you think but I am sure it is pretty pathetic. Also any ideas for future chapters would be much appreciated, I have only a vague idea for what happens in their first year and I do realise I am not meant to tell you that.
brennqt14: The offensive part was the comment Sirius made about Americans and their game of choice in the magic world, Quod. I see Remus and Sirius as good friends but you have to realise that the only times when they are best friends is when James is out of the picture as soon as James makes up with Sirius James is Sirius' best friend. That's the way it is.
YoshimiWolfspaw: Thanks!
elsawriter: Glad to see you are reviewing regularly again, sorry if this is being nosy but what happened? You don't have to answer just curious. Glad you liked Remus I think it's the kind of thing he would do since he has to hold so much in, it will be in some ways a great relief when they finally find out.
marauding-siriusly: I think that America as a nation is slightly insane but when you get them on their own some of the nicest people in the world. Anyway "Great genius does not come without slight insanity" or something like that.
Dazzling Dame: You are comparing me to the best Marauder writer of them all, the most magnificent Mordred, thank you so much, personally I think both of those writers are better than me but then if you think differently more power to you! I would love to be in your C2 and I would also love to be a staff member, there is just the slight problem of the fact thatI have no idea what they are or what I would have to do. Review and tell me. If you want me to review your stories you will have to be logged on, I cannot operate the ffn search engine to save my life. Thank you for the compliment about the OC's sometimes it is really difficult, especially the Gryffindor's because I know so much about them and I would love to tell you about them but then I have a quick look at how JKR does it and I calm myself down. The OC's are going to appear quite a bit but they will mostly be background characters like Lavender or Dean. Thank you again for the great review I hope that this chapter meets with your satisfaction.
taylor: Wish granted.