Disclaimer: All of the funny lines are from the movie Blazing Saddles.
Chapter 2, Potterville: In which Lucius Malfoy schemes in the role of Hedley Lamar, various Weasleys are molested by Draco and his gang, and Remus Lupin narrowly avoids the hangman's noose.
Draco Malfoy leaned over the handsome oak desk in his father's tastefully decorated office, pointing to a map of the prairie. "See here, Paw, th' railroad's gonna hafta go right through the town of Potterville."
"Potterville," mused Lucius. "Splendid, splendid. That land is going to be worth millions of galleons, once the railroad goes through. Oh, if I could only get my hands on that gold!"
"Well, Paw, I was thinkin'—"
"Be silent, Draco, whilst I come up with a plan." Malfoy looked at his rustic, uncouth son with distaste and wondered for the thousandth time if he really was the father. Narcissa had always denied any infidelity, even under veritaserum, but Lucius still had his doubts. He turned away and shuddered delicately as Draco spat a stream of tobacco juice in the general direction of the brass spittoon in the corner. He missed by a good eighteen inches, staining the rug with slimy brown goo.
"You got yerself a plan yet, Paw?"
"My mind is a-glow with whirling transient nodes of thought, careening through a cosmic vapor of invention," Lucius assured him.
"Ditto!" Draco said.
"Ditto? You provincial putz... Wait, wait, I have a plan. There's only one thing standing between me and that land: the rightful owners. Draco, we have to drive every last man, woman,and child out of Potterville."
"I know, Paw," Draco said eagerly. "We kill the firstborn male child of every family."
Malfoy considered for a moment, then dismissed the idea. "No... Too Jewish."
"Okay, okay, me an' th' boys will work up a number six on 'em!"
"A number six? I'm not familiar with that one, Draco."
Draco's pale eyes lit up as he launched into his description. "That's where we come ridin' into town, a-whampin' and a-whompin' everyone in sight t' within an inch of their lives!"
"Splendid!" Lucius enthused. He grabbed hold of Draco's bandaged head. "Perhaps you are my son, after all." Draco shrieked in pain. "Why, son, you're injured. What happened?"
"Oh Paw, that uppity werewolf Remus Lupin done clocked me on the haid wit' a shovel," Draco whined. "I got him locked up downstairs. It would sure mean a lot to me if you'd hang him by the neck until he's dead."
"Certainly, my boy, certainly."
Lucius crossed to the window. He looked down on a courtyard where a gallows was set up. The former Death Eater Macnair, dressed in his customary black executioner's hood, was just putting the noose around the neck of a short, elderly man. The man's violet top hat was knocked off by the noose and Macnair returned it to him with profuse apologies.
"Oh, no trouble, no trouble at all, sir," squeaked the condemned. He bowed and the top hat promptly fell off again.
"Macnair," Lucius called.
"Yes, sir?"
"I've got a special for you; when can you fit him in?"
Macnair considered, wringing his hands. "I couldn't possibly stretch his neck before Monday, sir. I've got two men out with the flu." He indicated the long line of prisoners lined up behind Dedalus Diggle, sullenly waiting for their own appointments with the gallows. "As you can see, sir, we're swamped."
"Monday it is, then." Lucius waved Draco away. "All taken care of, son."
——————
Across the desert, the red-haired residents of the peaceful frontier town of Potterville, unaware of the impending whampin' and whompin', went about their business. Over at the little whitewashed country church, the Reverend Percy Weasley worked on his Sunday sermon and worried that he hadn't quite managed to achieve the proper ratio of fire to brimstone. In the one-room red schoolhouse, schoolmarm Penelope Clearwater taught the town's children their three R's. Bill Weasley slipped out the side door of the bank and sidled across the street to the saloon run by his twin brothers Fred and George. He would stop in for a little nip of gillywater before getting back to work. Behind the counter in the mercantile, Arthur Weasley measured out a pound of coffee for Arabella Figg. At the desk in the corner, his wife Molly balanced the books and complained about the credit he'd extended to Mundungus Fletcher.
Down the street at the newspaper office, a bored Ginny Weasley typed up an editorial about corruption in Governor Dolores Umbridge's administration; an editorial she knew she'd never publish. In the back room, the Creevey brothers played an endless game of Exploding Snap. It was a slow day for news.
Ginny looked up from her typewriter as the low thunder of hoofbeats sounded along the road leading into town. "Dennis, Colin, get out here! Looks like a big crowd of desperadoes is aimin' to shoot up the town!"
Sure enough, by the time the brothers had raced to the window, Draco Malfoy and his band of cutthroats were shooting and stampeding through Potterville like nobody's business. Ginny screamed and flung up a shield charm just in time as gunfire shattered the window. All across town, the Weasleys and their friends were under attack.
Draco chortled with glee as he used a reductor curse to blow up the town's pride and joy, a two-seater outhouse. Sturgis Podmore and Elphias Doge bolted for cover, their trousers around their ankles. Across the street at the saloon, rockets screamed through the air as Fred and George, barricaded behind the bar, repulsed the wave of invaders with Weasleys' Wildfire Whiz-bangs.
Two desperadoes had cornered Arabella Figg and were punching and kicking her viciously. "Have you ever seen such cruelty?" she cried out to no one in particular. Molly Weasley rolled up her sleeves and waded into the fray to rescue the elderly squib with a couple of well-aimed bat-bogey hexes. Then, like a swarm of locusts, Malfoy's gang was gone as swiftly as they'd arrived.
——————
The town council of Potterville met in the church, it being one of the few buildings that hadn't had all of its windows shot or hexed out. Percy Weasley, in his black suit and white cleric's collar, stood at the pulpit and led his flock in a timeless hymn of faith.
"It's time to come to a decision. Are we to stay or up and quit?" the congregation sang. "There's no avoiding this conclusion; our town is turning into shit."
"A-men," Percy intoned. "Now, I don't have to tell you good folks what has been happening here in our beloved little town: sheriff murdered, crops burned, stores looted, people stampeded, and cattle raped. The time has come to act, and to act quickly... I'm leaving!"
Mundungus Fletcher, disreputable as ever in stained and greasy denim overalls over a red flannel union suit, leaped to his feet and waved his floppy felt prospector's hat in the air. "Now listen here, you pious prairie pissant, nobody's goin' nowhere," he roared. "Colsarnit, I was born here, an' I was raised here, and dad gum it, I'm a-gonna die here, an' no sidewindin', bushwackin', hornswagglin' cracker-croaker is gonna ruin my biscuit cutter!"
Arthur Weasley stood up and applauded. "We all owe Mundungus our thanks for saying what needed to be said," he cried. "And I'm glad these dear children were here to witness Dung's speech. Not only was it authentic frontier gibberish, but those words showed a courage that is seldom seen in this day and age. What have we become?" he chastised to the congregation. "Our fathers made their way across the prairie. They fought for this land. Fought Indians, fought locusts, fought drought! Are we gonna just give up without a fight?"
"Hoo-ah," Mundungus shouted incoherently from his seat on the amen pew.
"Arthur Weasley is right," said Sturgis Podmore. "I say we stay and fight for our town."
"Hoo-ah!"
"Sturgis is right about Dad being right," George Weasley agreed. "I'm not about to give up my saloon—that my brother and I conjured with our own two wands— not for nothin' or nobody!"
"Hoo-ah!"
"George is right!" Fred Weasley shouted.
"Reverend?" challenged Mundungus Fletcher.
"Oh, all right," Percy said resentfully. "But, if we're going to stay... And I for one think it's a big mistake... We're going to need a new sheriff." He looked over the packed church. "Well? Which one of you boys is it gonna be?"
"Why should we risk one of our own?" George piped up. "I say we owl the governor. Ask her to send us a sheriff!"
Fred jumped to his feet. "George is right," he cried. "We'll send an owl to the governor and demand a new sheriff!"
"Let us all rise and pray for the swift deliverance of our new sheriff," Percy intoned. "I will now read from the books of Matthew, Mark, Luke—" The stained glass windows shattered as a hail of dungbombs were hurled into the church. "—and DUCK!" Percy concluded.
——————
Lucius Malfoy was in a foul mood. He scowled at the piece of pink parchment on his desk; the note had just arrived by owl from Governor Umbridge, instructing him to select a new sheriff for the town of Potterville.
"A sheriff means law and order—the very last things I want to encourage!" Malfoy rested his sleek platinum-blond head in his hands for a moment. A calculating gleam appeared in his eyes as he finally raised his head. "But wait, perhaps I can turn this situation to my advantage," he pondered. "Yes... What if I were to appoint a sheriff so objectionable, so vile, that his very appearance offends the good citizens of Potterville so much that they pack up and leave town?" Malfoy frowned. "Splendid... But where would I find such a man?"
The dull thunk of the gallows trapdoor interrupted the elder Malfoy's musings. He stepped over to the window just in time to see the werewolf Remus Lupin led up the gallows steps. Macnair placed the noose around his neck. Looking down at the shabbily dressed, greying wizard, Malfoy began to laugh maniacally. "Yes, yes, perfect!" he cried. "Potterville will be a ghost town in no time!"