Authors Note:

Hi all!

I know i already posted today, but I'm so grateful to you all for reading, i decided to give you another update as a thank you. This one is dedicated to everyone who chose to read (even in the future - spooky).

Hogwarts and pranking is pretty much this chapter.

Again I really don't own anything. Not HP, not the Marauders, and not any of the music mentioned. If I missed an obvious piece, please let me know, and I'll amend.

Please, enjoy.

Chapter 4

Weariness and suspicion permeated the air in the Great Hall. The Marauders were nowhere to be seen; never a good thing with their reputation. McGonagall led the new students into the Great Hall, the firsties looking around in awe - everyone completely missing the five pairs of eyes peering around the doors. When McGonagall presented the Sorting Hat with her usual flourish, a wordless spell was cast. The students leaned forward in anticipation of the Hat's latest words of wisdom, a very different voice emerging from the rip in the brim. The voice was a mischievous mix of all five Marauders' voices, interspersed with single voices every now and then.

'We're sorry for hijacking the Sorting Hat, but there was simply no other way. You see, we are the Marauders five, and we have some things to say. First of all, as you will notice, our absence is rather evident, but if we were in attendance our detentions would be prevalent. (And you said we wouldn't be able to rhyme it, Moony - Shut up, Padfoot). Second of all, if we were you, we wouldn't touch any of the food on the Slytherin side of the room. We've heard that Nick's deathday food is rather more fresh, but anyway it is all laced with slugs that eat flesh. And now that we've got your attention, and yes professor we know we'll spend our lives in detention; we feel it is only our duty to tell you things that our beloved Headmaster won't tell you because he's fruity. First, if you're useless don't even bother coming to the Gryffindor quidditch tryouts. Our intrepid Captain (Mr Prongs) hates time wasters and has a very low idiot threshold - looking right at you, Snivellus. Secondly, the Forbidden Forest will be holding all night raves from Halloween to Christmas, so do stop in and have a chat with the friendly centaurs who will shoot trespassers on sight. Third, Mr Moony is a prefect and will enforce the curfew especially if you're a Slytherin. (Prongs! - Quiet, Moony, we're pranking). Fourth, if anyone uses the word Mudblood, be prepared for dire retribution; blood purity is just classist crap and we won't tolerate it. Fifth and finally - because this is getting a little boring - we only think it's fair to tell you that the real reason we're not in the Hall tonight is because you will all be leaving with an intense desire to boogie on down to Disco music, and Lady Astra threatened to hex Mr Padfoot's hair bright pink if we had to be inflicted with Godric awful disco. Sorry if you hate disco, Evans, but you should've gone out with be. It's not too late; yes/no?'

"Not a chance in hell, Potter!" Lily yelled, the Sorting Hat slumping in disappointment

'(Bad luck, Prongs - Was that sarcasm, Astra? - Yes, Moony, it was). Where were we? Ah, yes, the signing off. We feel we've taken up far too much of your time with what we've had to say. So, with one final message, we'll return you to your Sorting with no further delay. If there was any doubt, cast it all aside. We are the Marauders, fun and mischief are the rules for which we abide. We give this one piece of advice to first years and returning students alike; find yourself some friends in whom you can always trust. Friendship is the only thing that keeps us together sometimes. We're all we have, and all we need. So find friends and never let them of luck for your Sorting, and we were kidding about the food, it's delicious. Messrs Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot and Prongs, and Lady Astra; welcome back to Hogwarts - mischief managed.'

Safe in a disused staffroom in the Astronomy Tower, the Marauders burst into laughter, clutching their sides and gasping for breath. "Did you see their faces?" James chuckled, tears misting his glasses. "They have no idea what we did."

"Well, we weren't exactly lying about the disco" Remus reminded them gleefully. "We just didn't tell them the whole truth."

"They don't need to know about the personalised aspects coming through" Sirius waved a hand, grinning sharply. "And as for my deranged family and their pals, well they deserve a little embarrassment. Turnabout is fair play."

"Revenge is a dish best served cold" Peter smirked, tugging on the sleeves of his new denim jacket. Sirius chuckled grimly.

"And it is so very cold under a lake."

"Oh, don't be so dramatic, Padfoot" Remus chided, rolling his eyes. The effect was quite psychedelic when combined with James's. "Itching powder, clothes that magically become too small, short sheeting, and books that wail really bad poetry when opened is hardly what I would relate to that statement."

"The wolf has a point, Siri" Rose smiled, taking a bottle of butterbeer from the table.

"See, Rosie agrees with me!"

"Only because she doesn't know any better."

"Oi!"

"There's no way out of this hole I've dug for myself, is there?" Sirius asked rhetorically. James answered anyway.

"Nope."

"Thanks, mate, you're a treasure." Sirius' sarcasm was evident. James winked at him, a shit-eating grin on his face. "Sod off, Potter."

"You're sounding like Evans, Pads" James informed him, an expression of dawning comprehension in his eyes. "I have a plan; a crazy, beyond mental plan of making our prank even better."

"Does it involve Lily?" Rose asked curiously, knowing the look in his hazel eyes.

"Got it in one."

"Whatever it is, it's crazy and completely idiotic. Don't do it." Remus delivered it all in a deadpan voice. James flipped him off and turned eagerly to Sirius.

"I'm always in, you know me, Prongs" Sirius shrugged. "You lead, we follow; that's the way it works."

"You are our intrepid leader" Peter smirked, sarcasm falling from his words.

"Shut up, Pete" James grumbled, finishing the last of the butterbeer. "Come on, you lot. They'll all be in bed now, the castle is ours." Sirius rose to his feet with easy grace, scoffing at his best friend.

"As if it isn't always."

Five shadows crossed the Entrance Hall, keeping to the walls to muffle their steps. A ripple, and one shadow disappeared, the others gathering around a map. They stared, transfixed as James Potter's dot moved across the hallways of Hogwarts. Sirius slipped away afterwards, taking another area for himself, then Remus nodded at Rose and Peter and took off upstairs at a dead run. Peter took a deep breath, watching the pocket watch and map in his hand. "The diversions are up, Astra, are we ready?"

"On your mark, Mr Wormtail."

"Now." Rose grinned at him and ran into the Great Hall, wand out in readiness. Non-verbal spells were a doddle after the Animagus transformation, so all she had to do was wait until her fellow Marauders returned. Under the cover of darkness, and with the castle asleep, the Marauders set up what was sure to be one of their more memorable and yet less offensive pranks yet.

The next morning, Hogwarts Castle awoke to the smell of fresh flowers growing by every window (including some very rare plants indeed to appease the Slug and Professor Sprout). A more relaxed mood filled the Great Hall, while the students sat down to their breakfast. The Marauders (the obvious miscreants who implemented the prank) were nowhere to be seen, but they were rarely out of bed before the bell rang to signal the first class. At the high table, Professor McGonagall breathed a sigh of relief, slapping away a stray vine back from the table. Her shrewd gaze was the first to spot the five friends standing just outside the doors to the Hall. James cleared his throat, immediately gaining all eyes on him. With nothing more than a snap of their fingers (the sound as harmonious as the unusual friends), they stepped through the doorway as one. Music swelled the moment they entered; the Beatles' Revolution 1 seeming to come from the very air around them. "Did you really think last night was it?" James asked the room rhetorically, swaying gently to the music. "We're Marauders, we don't miss a prank."

"Music is the truest form of magic after love" Sirius added, hands casually in his pockets. "And so, out of the kindness of our hearts-"

"And forgetting how embarrassing this is going to be for all of us - we decided upon a little gift" Remus added, grinning unrepentantly.

"A musical, magical gift" Rose smiled, laughing as Sirius dipped her without warning.

"Allow us to demonstrate" Peter finished, nodding once at his fellow Marauders. Peter timed his exit from the Hall with the final notes of the song, James conducting the invisible band gleefully. He always loved it when a) the Beatles were involved, and b) when Remus tweaked his mad ideas. Peter stepped back into the room with a flourish, bowing deeply with the notes of With A Little Help From My Friends. James laughed and clapped his hands in delight, Sirius groaning quietly to himself. James grinned and all but ran to the door to be next, vibrating in excitement. He glanced briefly at Lily (who was stuck in an expression of awed shock) and stepped through. The Beatles' I've Just Seen A Face drifted from around him, James oddly blushing and avoiding their gazes. Remus, with a bright Marauder smirk on his face, waited until the very last note before leaving his breakfast and returning to the Hall. An expression of great concentration was on his face, and he seemed oddly proud that the oddly soothing Within You, Without You was coming from him. Sirius gagged and promptly coughed up some bacon, glaring at Remus for having the gall to play more Beatles.

"This wasn't planned" James offered apologetically, but he was smirking anyway. "Pads, Astra?"

"Hold your sodding hippogriffs, Prongs" Sirius glared, taking his time to carefully finish off the first of his plates of bacon - this one in an omelette. Rose caught herself laughing at his petulance, knowing that nobody made Sirius Black do anything he didn't want to do. "If it's the bloody Beatles again, Rosebud, I'll disown you." He winced when he heard what he said, but Rose just smirked at him; she was a Marauder too.

"Don't worry, Siri, James probably worked something in with his spell-"

"Astra!" James looked horrified. "Marauder Rule #1."

"Rules are made to be broken?"

"No, not that one" James waved a hand dismissively. "The other one."

"Marauder secrets go to the grave" Sirius intoned gravely. "Now, stop being such a berk, Prongs, and let Rosebud have her turn."

"Thank you, Siri" Rose smiled brightly, waving at Lily as she went. She took a deep breath, feeling uncharacteristically nervous about what she was about to do. She was Rose Marianne Evans, for Merlin's sake, she could handle whatever this was going to turn out to be. And by Godric, she bloody well would. Rose recognised the song the very moment it started playing; she'd first heard it while lying out on the grounds in the spring holiday, a wireless placed strategically among the roots of the beech tree. James had been off pestering Lily, Peter watching eagerly to report to the others. Remus was dozing off in the sunlight, tired from a Full Moon adventure. Sirius had been leaning against the trunk of the tree, keeping watch with an easy grace and keen interest. Rose had about made up her mind to go and rescue James from her sister's sharp tongue, when the song had come on the wireless. It was a Beatles song, but since Rose didn't much listen to the radio (the Marauders generally had more interesting things to do - and Petunia had despised the band), she hadn't heard it until then. The song was called I . Sirius pretended to glare at her, but couldn't help but smile even in the face of more Beatles. He was, by his own admission, a Punk Wrock kind of bloke, and while he appreciated the Fab Four, he preferred them in more moderation. "If I get the Beatles, I'll know it's a cosmic joke."

"Or maybe the Fab Four are the soundtrack of the Marauders?" James suggested, bacon in one hand, a sausage in the other.

"They certainly could be for how often you play their records in the dormitory" Frank muttered, Alice giggling in surprise.

"No taste, no vote, Longbottom" James snapped, pushing Sirius towards the doorway. The grey eyed Marauder clutched dramatically at Remus.

"Save me, Moony! Don't let him make me do it!"

"All for one and one for all" Remus parroted in an almost bored tone. "You know the rules, Padfoot." Sirius yelled like an extra in a B-Grade horror film and slumped like a puppet with it's strings cut. He stood on the other side of the doorway, briefly seemed to consider doing a runner and legging it out into the grounds, but caught Remus' suddenly stern glare. With the air of a man walking to his inevitable execution, Sirius stepped over the threshold and loped with a carefree stride back to his breakfast. Sirius was carefully calm, an expression his fellow troublemakers knew meant he was exercising his not-inconsiderable mental control. James rolled his eyes at the silence and pinched his best mate in the side - hard.

"Merlin, Prongs! That hurt, you sadistic bastard!" Sadly, his fellow Marauders ignored his justifiable outrage in favour of falling off the bench laughing. The Beatles' And I Love Her (a shockingly romantic song for the notorious Playboy) emanated from the air around him, a scowl taking up residence on his handsome face. "I hate you all."

"You'll really despise us within a week" Peter smirked, spluttering with a face full of scrambled egg.

Professor McGonagall's first period double Transfiguration class took twice as long to enter as it usually did. The Marauders had entered in groups - James and Sirius to the tune of He Ain't Heavy, He's My Brother (to which they remained deadpan), and Rose, Remus and Peter to Frank Sinatra's My Way (just because). They then had the glee of watching their classmates run in and try to muffle the sound somehow. Frank and Alice walked in to Elton John and Kiki Dee's Don't Go Breaking My Heart, and Benjy to Stairway to Heaven - he shrugged and looked as though he didn't much care. Marlene, Dorcas and Mary skipped in to the tune of the Time Warp (Remus looking jealous), while Snape slunk in to the embarrassment of Peggy Sue. Lily watched the Marauders - especially James - for a long moment, nodded to herself and then stepped in as if having music suddenly surround her was completely normal. She too, was gifted the genius of the Beatles, Rose suspecting James' influence in the choice of Here Comes The Sun. Professor McGonagall entered to the muted strains of a mournful bagpipe, fixing her sharpest glare upon the five Marauders. "I have just come from an emergency meeting of the Heads of House. The Headmaster wishes me to inform you five that he is intensely proud of the feat you achieved, and the kindness of your act." Sirius caught their eye and mouthed 'prank'. "To that end, you have each been awarded twenty points." Lily smiled slightly, Rose almost doing a double take at her sister. "Gryffindor is now out of negative points. Furthermore, as your acts have been helpful to Professor's Sprout and Slughorn, you will only have to serve a week's detention each - this includes the punishment from last night's prank."

"Only a week, Minnie?" Sirius yelled in outrage. "I thought we had something special." McGonagall thinned her lips at him.

"Sit down, Black."

"Sitting down now, Minnie, my dearest."

"Professor?" Lily raised her hand curiously. "Will Professor Flitwick be able to remove the charms?" Rose definitely saw McGonagall glance towards the Marauders proudly before she answered.

"He is reluctant to try. He still remembers the Firework Fiasco, the Dungbomb Disaster-"

"The Slime Situation?" James piped up, grinning in unison with Sirius. The duo batting suggestions back and forth.

"Or the Niffler Nightmare?"

"The Potato Problem?"

"The Doxy Dilemma?"

"The Portrait Panic?"

"Possibly the Fondue Fountain Frustration?"

"The Corridor Catastrophe?"

"The Shifting Staircase Suspicion?"

"Thank you, Mr Potter, Mr Black" McGonagall said calmly, silencing them both easily. "I'm sure you'll enjoy continuing that enlightening discussion in detention next week." James grinned at her with sparkling eyes.

"Yes, Professor, thank you Professor." Remus slapped the back of his head and wore his most angelic expression.

"Now, to the basics of human transfiguration. Can anyone tell me-" James raised his hand immediately, just like every other time McGonagall asked a question.

"Teachers pet" Sirius teased, and Rose had to smile; the year was off to a great start already.

Thank you for reading!

Reviews give Remus chocolate