Disclaimer: I don't own this.

AN: This story has become a collaborative effort between me, Midnight Lily, and Steve2. While I will take credit for the main story line, both Midnight Lily and Steve2 have made substantial contributions that I personally feel have greatly improved the story. If you need an example, for those of you that have already read Chapter 9, go back and read it again after the newly revised chapter has posted (replaced it 4/14/2005 so it should be up by 4/15/2005 at the latest).

Chapter 12 Wedding Bell Blues

LOVE, n. A temporary insanity curable by marriage or by removal of the patient from the influences under which he incurred the disorder... It is sometimes fatal, but more frequently to the physician than to the patient."
- Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary, 1911

Amber and Remus' wedding had gone off with barely a hitch. Guests had arrived when and where they were supposed to arrive, the vows were said with no stumbling or embarrassing moments and the ladies had all teared up at the appropriate moments. In fact the actual wedding itself had been hitchless: it was the reception that had proved interesting.

Professor Dumbledore had given special permission for the Weasleys, Harry and Hermione to attend the wedding. They would portkey over with Alexis and Snape Friday evening after classes and return Sunday morning.

Ginny and the Weasley twins had volunteered to baby sit the Snape twins while Snape and Alexis were busy with wedding arrangements. That was the only reason Snape had agreed to escort the Gryffindor group. He trusted Ginny to keep Fred and George in line, and by bringing their own babysitter, they could bring the twins. It would have been hard to find someone to keep the boys since Hogwarts was going to be short staffed with many of the teachers attending the wedding and it just didn't feel right leaving the boys to the care of a house elf for three days straight.

Snape had tried to get away with only escorting Ginny, but she had refused to go unless he agreed to escort the rest. Not that any of the rest were all that thrilled about having Snape as a chaperone. Arthur and Molly would be meeting them in France and would take over the responsibility.

Dumbledore had officiated at the ceremony and everything had gone off smoothly. The babies had slept through the whole event under the watchful eye of Molly Weasley. Remus had never looked happier and Amber positively glowed.

Snape had arranged a reception immediately following the wedding. Alexis admired the three tiered wedding cake that was floating gently above a champagne fountain. There was a band playing on a raised dais and several serving stations scattered throughout the room.

"I am really impressed," Alexis said smiling up at her husband.

Snape accepted the compliment as his due. The band leader called for everyone's attention, "Mr. and Mrs. R. J. Lupin will open the dancing."

The band started playing a Muggle song, Could I Have This Dance For the Rest Of My Life as Remus swept Amber out onto the floor and they began to sway to the music.

After they had danced for a moment in the spotlight, the master of ceremonies asked for the mother and father of the bride to join, then best man and maid of honor. Finally the floor was opened to everyone.

Snape held Alexis close as they danced thinking back to the first time they had danced. "At least I don't have to worry about the length of your skirt this time," he whispered against her ear.

"No, but if I drop anything tonight I am going to let you pick it up for me," she whispered back. Her dress was floor length, but the top had a deep v-neck.

"I really wish you wouldn't wear such provocative clothing," Snape said again. "At least not until Aniya is finished brooding."

"Just think, our little Aniya is going to be a mother," Alexis grinned. "Although I'm still trying to figure out when and how she met the father."

"From what I could understand, she is actually an 'it.' She decided she wanted to have children to train to protect our children so she laid eggs and fertilized them," Snape explained.

Alexis shrugged philosophically. This wasn't the strangest thing she had ever heard after all.

Molly and Arthur had retired and taken Aleser and Nathair with them after extracting promises of good behavior and making threats of dire consequences should the promises be broken from their brood.

Alexis was dancing with Remus and Snape was dancing with Amber when the first guest turned into a giant canary. Before long there was a whole flock of giant yellow canaries fluttering around one of the food stations.

Fred and George were looking around wildly, "It wasn't us. I swear we wouldn't do something like that to Professor Lupin."

At another table the guests were turning into piglets. They started running around squealing. "We haven't even released the Porcine Petit Fours yet," Fred said, looking around for an exit.

The piglets were soon joined by kittens scampering all over the place. George looked at Fred, "Did you bring the Kitty-Kat Klusters?" Fred shook his head still trying to find the exit as far away from the infuriated bride and groom as possible.

Just then one of the piglets ran into a waiter causing the waiter to trip and fall on the end of the table holding a punch bowl.

The punch bowl flew up in the air and stopped as about four levitation spells hit it at the same time.

Unfortunately, the force of so much magic hitting the fragile glass container caused it to shatter.

Since the punch bowl had been the focus of the magic, the glass shards continued to float in midair; however, the punch fell in a sudden downpour on Amber's unsuspecting aunt.

Poor Aunt Maude let out a squeal to rival the piglets and in a knee jerk reaction cast a hex hitting her sister-in-law whom she had not spoken to in twenty years.

The sister-in-law retaliated to the unprovoked attack by casting a jelly legs jinx; unfortunately, the tickling hex she had been hit with had her hand shaking so badly that she missed Aunt Maude and hit Uncle Erwin.

Now Uncle Erwin had indulged himself in all the free liquor and was slightly the worse for wear. His advanced state of inebriation coupled with the jelly leg jinx led to him not being able to maintain his balance in the slightest. Panicking as he started to fall, Uncle Erwin grabbed the first thing that came to hand: Cousin Pam's robes.

Now Cousin Pam's robes were already under a great deal of stress because she had recently invested in an augmentation potion. Being a cheapskate, she had purchased the potion from Mexico instead of paying the extra and getting it from a licensed Beautification Healer. So instead of going up one bra size, she had gone up two bra sizes on the right breast and four on the left. She had not purchased new robes and had instead squeezed herself into ones she already had, causing the seams on her robes to become structurally unsound. The already stressed seams finally gave out when Uncle Vernon grabbed the front of Cousin Pam's robes to keep from falling, leaving Cousin Pam in nothing but her knickers and bra, revealing the true horror of an improperly prepared augmentation potion as one breast not only was larger than the other, it was covered in scales and the other breast was blue: although not much of the blue could be seen because Cousin Pam had stuffed that cup with socks to try and even out her cleavage.

Now the sight of Cousin Pam in nothing but her knickers and bra with one scaly breast and one blue breast caused Great Uncle Homer to grab his chest and start panting.

His son, Homer Jr., ran up to help his father thinking that Homer Sr. was having a heart attack.

Senior proceeded to push Junior out of the way as Senior was not having a heart attack but was in fact grabbing for a camera in the top pocket of his robes and Junior was going to be blocking the shot of Cousin Pam.

Junior, being ninety himself, was not all that steady on his feet and when Senior pushed him out of the way Junior fell and landed on what had at first been a piglet, but had quickly grown to a full size hog.

The hog took off running with Junior draped over its back. A round of magic was fired at the hog and Junior in an attempt to rescue the elderly wizard and the hog that was in fact a transfigured guest. This resulted in the hog turning purple with pink daisies and Homer Jr. levitating into the air and beginning to spin wildly about two feet off the floor face down.

One of the kittens noticed Junior's tie hanging down and spinning so began to try and catch it. The kitten was so proud of itself as it managed to hook its tiny claws into the spinning silk: until the force of the spinning material jerked it off of its hind feet and sent it flying through the air to land hissing and scratching on Aunt Bea's new hat. The kitten decided that anyplace was better than where it was at this current moment in time and took off running, straight down the back of Aunt Bea's new robes.

Aunt Bea was a lady of large girth and enjoyed the freedom of loose robes.

The kitten got lost inside the voluminous fabric and started running laps, jumping her garters and crossing her thighs.

Aunt Bea hadn't noticed the kitten landing on her hat and so was very surprised to feel something soft running across her thighs. Looking over at her neighbor, a wizard by the name of Mr. Crapse, she gave the surprised man a come hither look and grabbing his robes pulled him into a passionate kiss. Now Aunt Bea had married four wizards and buried four wizards so if there was one thing she knew how to do it was kiss a man. It wasn't long before the wizard under attack went from pushing her away to pulling her to him.

The embrace had proceeded to the point where a pool had started on whether or not the couple would actually consummate their embrace where they sat, or if they would come to their senses and get a room.

Before the bet could be decided, the Kitty-Kat Kluster wore off.

Aunt Bea's embrace suddenly became a ménage a trois as the kitty lost in her robes had never managed to find its way out before the spell broke.

Aunt Bea now had one wizard trying to get into her robes and one wizard trying to get out from under them. The lady hadn't had so much attention since her second honeymoon and became overwhelmed by all the sensations and fainted.

This did allow the onlookers to assist the kitten, now transformed back into a guest, out from under her robes.

Cooler heads luckily prevailed when Mr. Crapse saw another man coming out from under his new lady love's robes and started to challenge him to a duel. They were able to distract Mr. Crapse by turning his attention back to Aunt Bea who was starting to come round and thus prevent the challenge from being issued.

By this time, all the canaries had molted, the pigs had porked out and the kittens had shed, leaving confused and angry guests wondering what the hell had just happened. Remus and Amber, along with the Hogwarts staff who had attended the wedding, were advancing on Fred and George Weasley. It looked as if the infamous twins had finally gone too far. No one was listening to their protestations of innocence.

Ginny loved her brothers, but even she felt they were about to get what was coming to them. After all this was Professor Lupin, everyone liked him. If it had been Professor Snape's wedding, well then she might have helped them escape. Leaning back against a table to watch the show and also placing herself in position to run for her parents if it looked like the mob was actually going to do permanent damage to the twins, Ginny started to help herself to a snack from the tray a waiter had just brought out. Looking closely at the treat she had just picked up she realized it was one of Fred and George's Canary Creams. Grabbing the arm of the waiter she asked him, "Where did you get these?"

The waiter had a decidedly blank look on his face as he replied, "There was a large bag with boxes of these and other confections under the main table in the kitchen."

"Who told you to put them out?" Ginny asked, still not able to believe that Fred and George might in fact be innocent.

"No one told me to put these out. The head waiter just told me to keep the trays full. We were running out of sweets and so I used these. Did I do something wrong?" the waiter was beginning to get nervous.

"No, you didn't do anything," Ginny soothed him, before turning and pushing her way through the crowd. Using elbows and pinches, as she was too young to use magic outside of school, to get to the front of the mob, she reached Amber and Remus who were in an intense discussion of just what to do with Fred and George. Ginny grabbed Remus' arm as he was telling Amber that shaving them bald, painting their bodies blue and turning them out in the streets naked might sound like a good idea now, but since they were underage, might result in legal problems later. Remus looked down at Ginny impatiently. "Professor Lupin, they really didn't do it. I promise. I just found out from a waiter that he put the stuff out by accident."

"What did you say, Ginny?" Amber and Remus asked.

"They didn't deliberately put out all that stuff. I don't know why they brought it, but they didn't intend it for your guests. A waiter found the stuff and put it out by accident," Ginny was still holding onto Remus' arm as his wand was still twitching in the twins' direction.

"You are positive?" Remus asked.

"Yes sir, I am positive," Ginny said with a pleading look in her eyes that stronger wizards than Remus Lupin had been unable to withstand.

With a sigh and a last convulsive twitch of his wand, Remus turned to the angry mob that was holding aloft burning center pieces and serving forks chanting, "Kill the Monsters! Kill the Monsters!"

"Wait! EVERYONE WAIT JUST A MINUTE!" Remus yelled. Once he had everyone's attention, "They really are innocent."

"This time!" came a voice from the crowd. "Let's get 'em for all the stuff they've done in the past! Maim the monsters! Maim the monsters!"

"SHUT UP, RON!" Fred and George hollered.