I am so so so so so sorry! I can't believe I haven't updated this fic in so long! Blame it on school! And writers block. But I finally finished it and here it is. Hopefully it isn't terrible. Sorry once again! Leave me a review!...
Friday.
Today was Friday. The day of the prank.
James was hyperventilating.
"What if it does not go as planned?!"
"It will." Peter said irritably.
"How do you KNOW?"
"James. James! Shut up!" Sirius said snapping.
"Well, if you're going to be that way..."
"Shut up for Merlin's sake!" The three boys yelled at their comrade.
"Okay.."
XXXXXXX
"Are you sure it's going to be okay?" Came the question thirty seconds later.
"Seriously?!" Remus groaned. "We just got over this!"
"But really, are you sure?"
"I give up!" Peter sighed. "Remus you wanna go check up on Frank, Fabian and Gideon? They did tell us to meet them before breakfast began."
"Sure. Anything to get away from this lunatic."
"Don't leave me!"
"Sorry Sirius. But you'll just have to stay."
"Why?"
"How rude."
XXXXXXX
One minute later...
"Sirius? Sirius Black?" James asked.
"Yeaas?" Sirius asked, dragging out the word, in an attempt to make James forget whatever he was going to say.
It didn't work.
"Will Hogwarts be surprised at our prank or not?"
Sirius was surprised. This was the first time James had framed the question like this. He must really be worried.
James was his best friend... it was his, Sirius Black's duty to console and be there for him in times of happiness, and in times of sadness...
This was really sounding like a wedding vow.
"James listen to me," Sirius began.
James was pacing around like a homicidal maniac. "James! Look at me right now!"
James turned, glanced around and then turned back to his pacing.
"Potter, you listen to me right now! Nothing is going to happen! The prank is sailing smoothly and nothing is going to change that!"
"Guys?" Said a small voice. "Something's wrong."
...
"WHAT? What happened?" Sirius screamed blue murder.
"Calm down Sirius. Weren't you telling James to do that a minute ago?" Remus asked amused.
"Yeah Black. What happened to the whole 'sailing smoothly' and all that crap." James said smirking slightly, feeling a little too pleased with himself.
"Shut up! What went wrong?"
"We can't find Frank or Fabian or—!" Peter said.
James interrupted sarcastically, "Let me guess, Gideon?"
"Yes, how did you know?" Remus retaliated.
"For Merlin's sake you guys! What if McGonagall found out? Dumbledore? We are doomed! I will die without dirtying the family name! Oh woe is me!" Sirius cried dramatically.
"Shut up Black!"
"Why?" Sirius whined.
"And you shouldn't say stuff like that. Your family is the one who feed you.." Remus said primly, his nose in the air.
"Really Lupin?" James raised an eyebrow. "You actually believe that?"
"No of course not! The Black are filthy mangy curs!" Remus said. "Duh."
"Can we come back to the more pressing issue? None of the three 'devils' are to be found anywhere!" Sirius wailed.
"Sirius, I'm sure they just forgot and went out for a walk or something." James said, trying to reassure his friend.
"James, stop making up stupid excuses. Nobody goes out for a walk at five bloody o'clock!"
"...oh right. Sorry that was stupid."
"You're stupid." Remus said childishly sticking out his tongue.
"So are we going to go look for them or not?" Peter asked holding open the door.
XXXXXXX
"I can't believe I was so worried!" Sirius complained.
They had found Frank and the gang the minute they stepped out of the common room. They were returning from somewhere ( most likely the kitchen ) with arms laden with hot chocolate and croissants.
Remus immediately snagged the chocolate, even the ones meant for the devils. When Gideon tried to snatch it back, he was thrown through the portrait hole, falling head first onto the carpeted floor.
"You were worried? I'm so touched Sirius!" Frank said grinning.
"It's so heartwarming to see that someone cares about us! Isn't it Gideon?" Fabian cried.
"Mrghhh." Came the strangled response from the floor.
"I'll take that as a yes." Fabian smiled, glad to see his brother taken down. "Why were you looking for us anyway?"
"You told us to meet you to go over the last minute details, remember?" Sirius asked.
"Right. Of course we did. What last minute details are we talking about?" Frank asked. "Gideon you can get up any time you like."
"Yeah, stop being so dramatic, wimp. Taken down by a first year." Gideon snorted.
"Remus is really strong. I have nothing to be ashamed of." Gideon said standing up.
"Too right he is!" Sirius groaned. "It's really unfair how quickly he took the chocolate from me yesterday. He didn't even exert himself."
"Enough about your boyfriend!" James scolded. "The house-elves still on with the plan?" He added turning to the other three.
"Yes. They have started preparing the food and we saw them putting in the potion." Gideon said, rubbing his nose.
"And the potion is working. We tried it out on Rinky." Frank added.
Peter looked horrified at the thought of someone torturing a poor house-elf who had done nothing wrong.
"Don't worry she did it willingly." Fabian said at the look on Peter's face.
"Oh thank Merlin."
"Will you shows the kitchens?" James asked hopefully.
"No kiddo. It's just something you have to find in your own, especially if you are pranksters. Otherwise it just doesn't feel right." Frank said, ruffling James' hair.
"Fine."
"So what about your part of the plan? You said you had a surprise planned for us?" Fabian asked.
"Yeah. Remus please explain." Sirius said, looking at child-Remus who was slurping up hot chocolate like there was no tomorrow.
"Lupin!" Three sets of voices yelled at him.
"What now?" Remus asked irritably.
"Explain what we added to the prank." Sirius said slowly, as if talking to a child.
"Okaay. We added fireworks that would go off when McGonagall yelled at us." Remus began but was rudely interrupted.
"Seriously? You triggered it to go off at a particular sound?" Gideon whistled sounding amazed.
"Well yes. As I was saying, the fireworks will spell 'The Devils in collaboration with The Marauders proudly present to you the first pranks of the year! Starring Romance!"
"Nice!"
"Woah! Awesome!"
"That is so amazing! Talent!"
"Aaaand... The best part is no one is going to know who the Marauders are!" Sirius exclaimed.
"So we get all the blame?" Fabian asked suspiciously.
"Do you go around telling people how you are called The Devils?" James asked.
"No. We just made that name over the summer."
"Well, that answers your question. We are going to be completely anonymous." Peter said happily. "No detentions."
"That reminds me - I heard you got detentions already? First week? That's impressive." Gideon said.
"Yes. All four of us have one detention this Saturday, Peter has an essay to write and James and I have two weeks worth of detention in addition to this since we were 'disrupting' breakfast."
All boys laughed, remembering the hilarious occasion which had led to these many detentions. Remus was actually pretty good at acting.
"See you in an hour." Frank called over his shoulder.
"See you." The Marauders saluted.
XXXXXXX
"Merlin! It's happening! It's happening!" Sirius squealed.
"I can't wait to see how it goes!" Remus said excitedly.
"Everyone will have beards! Wonder what will happen to Professor Dumbledore's." Peter said wonderingly.
"Yay! Bloody Merlin! I was so worried! But the stress was worth it. This is the best moment of my life!" James said happily.
The four were giggling like school-girls on a holiday. Walking down the corridor , laughing and grinning like maniacs, they attracted unwanted attention from their peers, professors and Mrs Norris, Filch's cat.
"Why are you so chirpy boys?" Professor Flitwick asked them in his squeaky voice as he passed by.
"What are you up to?" McGongall asked, her voice a dangerous octave lower.
The Marauders had learned from experience that when Professor McGongall's voice got lower that meant she was either in a bad mood, or about to give someone a detention or suspicious about someone's activities.
In this case, it was probably the latter.
Though you never could tell with Minerva McGongall.
"Boys! Do stop walking around like a couple of undead zombies and stop gawking at everyone and everything!" Professor Slughorn cried in anguish on seeing the blatant disrespect for his words.
"Undead zombies. That's what he said." Peter said. That set them off and they were laughing again, their high peals of laughter resounding on the walls of Hogwarts.
Walking into the Great Hall to see not many students sitting around was a disappointment. They had been expecting to see the Hall full of students with stunned looks on their faces as beards sprouted from their chins.
In reality, the food hadn't even arrived yet. So there was no chance of any sort of laughter.
The minute the four entered, the sleepy silence which had previously reigned turned into one of morbid tension. Who know what one of these first-years would do for 'love'?
Our four pranksters took their seats near to Lily Evans and her posse. This was something James insisted upon, still being infatuated with Red, as Sirius called her.
"Imagine what Red'll look like with a beard!" Sirius chortled.
James choked on his saliva, glancing furtively around at Lily to make sure she hadn't heard. "I didn't think of that! That's a sight I can spend my whole life without seeing!"
His three friends took no notice of his obvious discontentment as they laughed and made merry, happy on the fact that their prank was actually happening.
Gideon, Frank and Fabian entered the Hall and made for the Marauders. "Merlin! They are even worse than we were!" Gideon exclaimed when they saw the state their friends were in.
"How bad were you?" Remus asked curiously.
"We dumped eggs into the juice and poured it down our throats; made fun of all the teachers and got three weeks worth of detention for 'disrupting' breakfast." Fabian answered grinning at the memories.
"And then when Malfoy passed by us sneering, we tripped him." Frank added that.
"Don't forget that. It's a very important part." Gideon said.
"Ah... The good Old Days." Frank said sighing.
"It was last year, dimwits!" Remus face palmed.
"You will understand when you gain maturity." Gideon said importantly.
"So when will you understand?" Sirius asked.
"Such cheek! Respect your elders Black!"
"We will when you do." James retaliated.
There was a steady stream of students entering the Great Hall. After a while, all the latecomers were seated as well, and all the professors were seated as well, waiting for the food to materialise.
Lily still hadn't got over the fact that food at Hogwarts simply emerged apparently from the table.
"At home," she had said wonderingly to Jackie on her first day, "we had to shift the stuff from the kitchen to the dining room. Food never used to emerge like this."
Jackie had rolled her eyes and dug into the food telling Lily to do the same.
"Food at home—"
"Never used to emerge like this. We know Lily! You tell us everyday." Marlene, Mary, Alice and Jackie said exasperated."
"Oh right. Sorry." Lily said properly abashed.
"What do you think is wrong with those boys today? They are so rowdy." Marlene asked.
"Potter is always like this." Lily spat out. "He must have rubbed on Remus and the other boy. Black was always like that as well."
"Now Lily, don't you think you are being a bit too hasty? After all you barely know any of them." Mary asked.
"They were rude to Sev. That's all that matters."
Lily's friends sighed, obviously realising there was no use discussing this subject any further with Lily.
The food appeared and everyone tucked in.
The marauders watched in amazement as everyone spouted beards, themselves included.
"Potter! Black! Lupin! Pettigrew!" McGonagall shrieked.
BANG!
Sorry once again! Please leave me a review! I'll be updating again tomorrow, because I don't like leaving cliffhangers. Hopefully...
