A/N: NEW! No big changes!
UPDATED: 19/02/05
Disclaimer: (sighs) I own not the great invention of which we bury ourselves within the amazing world of it all, this truly belongs to the one, the only, the supreme, the fantastic, Joanne Katherine Rowling! All hail to her might! (okay, I'll stop now.)
"Men. This is a serious situation! Requiring your full and absolutely undivided attention!" snapped James, pacing back and forth with his hands behind his back like a general. Sadly, instead of having lean straight backed soldiers standing in a nice neat line and doing their stiff salutes, he had three friends who were lolling about on beds and chairs, listening with half an ear and thinking with even less of a brain.
"Right…" responded Sirius automatically without thinking, (which, come to that, wasn't really unusual for him.) lying on his back and tossing a nut from the bowl at his side into his mouth, or at least, he tried to. "Ow," he muttered as the nut hit him in the eye.
"Gotcha," muttered Peter, feverishly scribbling and trying to finish up his Ancient runes homework. Remus on the other hand, just looked at him seriously, sitting on his bed without saying anything.
"Will you lot listen?" he grumbled irritably, running his hands through his hair in frustration. The past five hours ever since classes had ended had not been kind to him. They had wandered around the school halls, trying desperately to get rid of the pictures that seemed to be stuck everywhere they looked, unheeding Lily's smug assurances that they couldn't force the photos off. After coming back with nothing but a bunch of failed spells and bruised fingers, he was in a very bad mood. Groups of students, particularly Slytherins who had been victims of their pranks, had taken great joy in making loud remarks and copying pictures to stick up in their Common Rooms.
Rumors had spread faster than chicken pox did in a kindergarten classroom. Everyone had a vague and extremely distorted idea of what was going on, but what all of them knew for sure was that Lily Evans and her friends were the first to successfully pull of a prank on the Marauder's captain, the great James Potter himself. Now, they were all about to face his wrath, and war would soon ensue. All day, girls had been going up to James and bitching about Lily Evans to him and telling him that he'd obviously win, trying to get on his good side, many saying that they still found him adorable in a diaper, and weren't those pictures sweet? Not that he needed to know that, he looked good in everything, after all, but that did not ease his wounded pride.
Not only that, the prank and additional photos had turned off many of his other fans who weren't quite so devoted, causing them to run off to Sirius's side, thereby making him lose points in his and his best friend's personal rivalry on girls. However, students who knew Lily well highly doubted that Hogwarts would survive, many patting James on the back and telling him that they would attend his funeral.
"Ow," mumbled Sirius again when another nut hit him on the forehead. Other than that, there was no response to his words.
"James," said Remus finally after a long expectant silence, broken only by scratches from Peter's quill and the occasional sound of a nut hitting either Sirius or his surroundings. He looked him in his eye and James winced, knowing that whenever a fellow Marauder used anther's birth given name in that sort of tone, it meant that they were seriously ticked off with said person. "You started this. You were the one poured the Babbling Bile into her juice, letting her make a complete idiot out of herself, and you have been the one who's been pranking her for years now. Don't you think that your attitude just now was just a bit overboard?"
"Don't you get it, Moony?" he whined, trying to stop himself from feeling guilty at Remus's words. Even though it was true, he hadn't meant to be that harsh or rough. It was just that, whenever he was around Lily, he would have this odd habit of trying to impress her by showing off with the Snitch or blasting people apart, thus looking like a fool, causing her to blow up, which would usually cause him to blow up. Though he would rather drink undiluted Buboter Pus right now than admit that. "She's crossed the line! We've been unprankable since first year! And now… now… in our seventh year, the very year we're ruling this school, she just goes ahead and gives me the most embarrassing moment of my life!"
"It was one of the best pranks that I've ever seen," commented Sirius, transfiguring the nuts into cherries on the account that they'd probably hurt less. "You've got to give her credit for originality, Prongs."
"Where did Runes mostly originate from?" interrupted Peter. "C'mon guys! Help me out here… only two more inches to go!"
"Egypt, I think," said Remus thoughtfully.
"But I have to agree with you on one thing, Prongs," said Sirius, now tossing cherries into his mouth instead. "Her prank definitely damaged Marauder image. The sight of you in that diaper was hilarious!"
"Thank you!" exclaimed James in relief. "Thank you!"
"What? For telling you that you looked hilarious in a diaper?" asked a very confused Peter, finally looking up from his parchment.
"No!" he replied, throwing a pillow at him. "Don't you see? We've got to get back at them! Like I said just now, we are herby at war with Evans and her friends. We won't stop until they come begging for mercy in front of the entire school!"
"You mean if they come begging for mercy in front of the entire school," said Remus pessimistically.
"They will!" he insisted. "Stop being so negative! Now, for the first prank, I was thinking that we start off with something not too veteran. You know, give them a taste of what it's like to deal with us before we let 'em have the full course." (Conveniently forgetting to mention that he wanted her to give up before he did anything drastic to her.)
"SCORE!" yelled Sirius as a cherry had finally landed in his mouth. Then, he quaked under James's glare. "I mean… Um… sounds great! What were we talking about again?"
"Yeah, what did you have in mind, Prongs?" agreed Peter.
"Alright, it's easy, really," he began, grinning rakishly. "Moony, I need you to-"
"Forget it," interrupted Remus bluntly. "Sorry, Prongs. But Lily happens to be a friend. You saw what happened when I helped you with the Babbling Bile… I don't want that to happen again."
"I can't believe you begged, Moony. Where is your Marauder pride?" grumbled Sirius.
"You're telling me that you're staying neutral in this?" burst out James incredulously. "But- but … we need you! You're the mastermind behind our plans!"
"Prongs. Flattery will get you nowhere," he replied firmly. "I know that you can very well come up with a few of your own ideas, but I'll help you with the Slytherins as long as you give me your word that you won't use it in the war."
"Fine. Marauder's honor," he sighed, defeated, thinking that he may as well make the best of it.
"There's no such thing as a Marauder's honor."
"There is now."
"Alright. Stop. Quit bickering," cut in Sirius, coming back to reality at long last. "I don't care as long as you don't side the girls either."
"Okay, Padfoot… You'll be stationed at…"
……
"There! Done!" exclaimed Lily in relief, putting down her quill and starting to arrange her notes.
"It's about time, Lily," grumbled Andrea, turning over on her stomach on the Common Room couch by the fire.
"Exactly," agreed Taylor, putting down the book that she was reading while ignoring the whispers that traveled around them. "I don't see why you have to do all this extra credit, you're already at the top for most classes."
"The keyword being 'most' not 'all'," replied Lily, stretching and leaning back in her chair. "As long as I'm a point or two ahead of Potter in anything, it'll annoy him to no end."
"You got that right," said Andrea, grinning in a sinister manner that completely countered the angelic features of her face. "He won't be able to stand it when we win this war. He absolutely detests losing anything, and I mean anything! Once, he lost in a game of Gobstones, and he sulked in his room for one whole day, refusing to come out!"
"You got that right, Andy," mumbled Taylor, throwing bits of parchment into the fire. "You two are lucky that you're not on the Quidditch team. I swear, sometimes that boy's a maniac."
"Hah! With Lily's fear of heights, she wouldn't even get off the ground!"
"Shut your trap!" said Lily, rolling her eyes and flushing at the mention of her phobia. She changed the subject quickly. "Okay, we're going to start as soon as possible. Tomorrow in History of Magic, we'll all be in the same class, and it's just before lunch. So…"
She laid out her entire plan, changing it from time to time after listening to suggestions from both of them. Finally, after the whole thing was planned out to the last minute detail, she jiggled her foot anxiously and asked, "So? What d'you think?"
"Brilliant," complimented Andrea, "Completely. positively and totally brilliant. Didn't know you had it in you, Lily!" she added with obvious pride, slapping Lily on the back.
"I've got to admit, Lily, it's good," said Taylor with a smile. But her brow creased into a worried frown, and she asked. "But this'll get us into trouble. I don't mind, but you're head Girl now. Don't you care about you're position?"
"I do…" answered Lily thoughtfully, "But Potter crossed the line. When he broke my clean record, I figured that my reputation's already tarnished, so a little more rust won't hurt, will it? And those stupid replies of his! A girl! Ugh!"
"I get what you mean, Lily," said Taylor, she imitated him, "You're just a girl…. You can't possibly match the Marauders in this field blah blah blah! Hmph! What a male chauvinist pig! Don't you agree, Andy? Andy?"
"Oy! Andy! What's up with you?" asked Lily, waving a hand in front of her eyes.
"I've been thinking…" she answered slowly.
"Well that's a new one."
"Shut up," she replied absently, throwing a cushion at Lily. "The Marauders always leave a sign after every prank. You know… it'll be their name in fancy writing, or just a sparkly 'M' thing. Anyway, after every prank of ours, I think that we should just leave a symbol. That way, people'll know that we did it."
"You got my attention," said Lily, mulling it over. "A way to make sure we get credit, and our symbol will be better than their stupid old 'M'! Another way to one up Potter!"
"One tracked mind," muttered Taylor.
"Exactly!" she said. "The teacher's will suspect it's us anyway, so a little advertisement won't hurt. Remember this morning? When you shot up the words 'Courtesy of the Flower and her girls'?"
"Sounds good," agreed Taylor. "We'll use a flower kind of signature. I mean, Lily, obviously," she said pointing at Lily, then to Andrea, "Andrea Rose. And me… well, I'm a Chinese, so my Chinese name is Lee Mei Hua, which basically means beautiful flower."
"Alright! I got it! Like this!" said Andrea starting to sketch on a spare bit of parchment.
"Umm… excuse me… Lily? Taylor?" asked someone uncertainly.
"What do you want, Remus?" replied Lily sharply, narrowing her eyes suspiciously, trying to ignore the flutter in her stomach.
"If you've come to spy, we'll hex you into next week!" threatened Taylor, picking up her wand.
Remus blushed and backed away slightly. "No! Nothing like that!" he protested, holding up his hands defensively. "I just wanted to tell you that I'm staying neutral during your feud with James… because both groups are friends… right?"
"Oh… I guess…" trailed off Lily, trying not to smile at how thoughtful he was, and to deflate the bubble of hope that was rising in her chest.
"Done!" said Andrea, startling the three of them. She had been so quiet and focused on her sketch that they had forgotten she was there. She held up her drawing, like all her other efforts, it was exquisite. On the left, there was a long stemmed rose with thorns and intricately drawn petals, on the right, was a morning glory, looking fresh and bright, and smack in the middle, seeming to float slightly above the other two flowers, was a lily. All the stems were woven together as though signifying unity; it would be easy to shoot up in a blaze of fireworks with the correct colours.
"What do you think?" asked Andrea, not even noticing that Remus was there, abruptly, she was brought down to earth. "Wait a second. What are you doing here?" she growled, narrowing her eyes just like Lily and quickly stuffing the parchment out of sight. "If you're spying, I'll hex you into next week!"
"Not again," he sighed, holding up his hands.
……
(The next day, in the Great Hall, slightly earlier than most students…)
"Ready Padfoot? Wormtail?" called James confidently, raising his wand and earning a few stares from early students. Remus was sitting silently, spreading jam on his toast.
Peter, who was standing near the door way gave him a thumbs up. Sirius, on the other hand was standing near James and examining the food with great interest.
"Mud cake! They have Super Fudge Triple Banana Chocolate On Chocolate Supreme Mud Cake!" shouted Sirius joyfully, launching himself at the pastry. "The house elves never make this!"
"Padfoot!" grunted James, holding onto the back of Sirius's robes, making him stop short of his destination with thrashing arms.
"Mud cake! I see you! My love! My passion! You're calling my name! Can't you here it, Prongs? It's saying Si-hiiiiii-rrrriiiiiuuuuussss! Siiiiirrrriiiiuuuussss! Come toooo meeeee…."
"Get back here, Sirius!" gasped James from the effort of yanking his robes back. "Come on! I need you to help me."
"But Prongs! Look! It even has bits of biscuits and whipped cream topped on it! Can you not see the sheer beauty of that cherry? The shape? The unearthly glisten? The sheen of the frosting! The absolute smoothness of the sauce! The-"
"Alright, alright!" he sighed, releasing Sirius and letting him gleefully bury his face into the cake. "Just… just make sure you're on guard, okay?"
"Mmf!" said Sirius, trying to form words, a chunk of chocolate from his mouth in a dangerous position.
"Never mind… just don't open your mouth," he said, backing away in fear of having crumbs sprayed all over him.
People were already starting to mill in drowsily, but James couldn't see a head of fiery red hair in the crowd.
"Prongs," called Peter urgently from the doorway. "She's coming!"
She walked in calmly, many people turned to stare with yesterday's fight still fresh in their minds. Everyone knew about it, most of them had expected her to turn up with tentacles or three eyes or something. The moment she entered the Hall, she scanned the sea of heads and locked eyes with James, both of them having a childish staring contest, too stubborn to look away first. At last, Lily's eyes began to water and sting, so she blinked and looked away, ignoring the triumphant grin on James's face.
Before they sat down, they checked the chairs carefully and tested the food; all the while shooting death glares at the Marauders. When everything seemed to be in order, they sat down and began to eat. James nudged Sirius, who looked up very reluctantly from his comfortable position in his cake, chocolate and icing covering half his face.
"Fhat djyo voo vahnt, Vrongsh?" he asked with great difficulty, hitting James with bits off cake from his mouth.
"Swallow that and hurry!" he muttered, wanting to get on with the prank before they left. Beside him, Remus gave them a reproachful look, which James thoroughly ignored. "I need you to help me!"
At last, Sirius choked down the remaining food, took a long swig of pumpkin juice and wiped the chocolate off his face. "Alright mate," he said when he was done, missing a large smudge on his nose. "Ready?"
"Been ready," grumbled James, raising his wand discreetly. Both of them positioned their wands and fired.
Nothing happened.
Lily and her friends continued eating, but when the food tasted weird suddenly.
"D'you think that there's something wrong with the food?" she asked Taylor, trying not to pay attention to Andrea who was stuffing her face like there was no tomorrow.
"Yeah. Weird though, it was okay a moment ago," she observed, chewing on a bit of bacon.
"What d'you think, Liz?" she said to the perky blonde next to her, wondering whether she had to make a trip to the kitchens to have a talk with the house elves, she was the Head Girl after all.
"Tastes fine to me," answered Liz nonchalantly. Abruptly, her eyes widened and her small mouth dropped open. Her pupils kept enlarging in an effort to assure the brain that what the optical sensors were receiving were true until her gray iris was only a thin line, she looked like she had just been petrified.
"Oh – my – gosh… Lily… I mean – how could you! I mean- umm… but- you… you! Oh… your-" she spluttered, eyeing the three of them in horror.
"What's wrong, Liz?" asked Lily in concern, looking around... Several students had begun to glance her way, looking away before suddenly doubling back an openly staring with their mouths agape. "Andrea, do you- GOOD LORD! WHAT HAPPENED?"
Andrea was wolfing down toast with liberal amounts of cream cheese like she always did. Today was no difference, except maybe for the tiny fact that her hair was purple.
A bright shiny violent shade of purple.
Now, it was steadily going down her face and to the rest of her body, before changing to violet, lavender, light blue, dark blue, cerulean, constantly melting into different shades of colours. Only then did it occur to Lily to look at herself, she rummaged through Andrea's bag and dug out the compact mirror that she knew was always there. She saw that her hair was a bright lurid green and flowing down to her body just like Andrea's. She turned to look at Taylor who was turning a rich of pink and magenta with a horrified expression.
All three of them realized what was happening and screamed.
Loudly.
Now, the entire hall was staring and pointing as they changed colours rapidly, occasionally gaining patterns like multicolored spots and stripes as well. People were beginning to laugh, and many who had been expecting something like this since the war was declared clapped and cheered, smacking the Marauders on the back. The only student who didn't look highly entertained by this was Remus, who looked at them with a half shocked half sad face, seeming quite torn. Even the teachers from the staff table were staring at them with their jaws scraping the ground. From the entrance, Peter shot up words in the form of a golden ribbon.
"From the Marauders,
THE REAL PRANKSTERS,
Not a bunch of idiot girls."
"Lily! Do something! My new dress robes won't match me anymore!" shrieked Andrea, turning a strange shade of puce with diagonal yellow lines streaking across her.
"Clothes! Is that all you can think of?" gasped Taylor incredulously, currently resembling a Dalmatian with chicken pox.
Lily opened her mouth to try to reverse the effect of the jinx, preferably on its originator. Then, she saw James give her a cocky grin and his hair anther rumple before he and Sirius raised their wands at the three of them. Lily fumbled with her own, but it was too late.
Suddenly, her leg jerked up and shining a rather fascinating shade of silver, she ran towards the teachers unable to even stop herself. Andrea leapt onto the table (now a rather pasty cream colour) began to sing in a loud, very off key redemption of "I'm a Little Teapot", while Taylor stood beside her miming the actions.
But Lily wasn't doing anything like that, instead, she had charged to the staff table, not in the slightest control of her body.
"Miss Evans! What's happening here?" yelled Professor McGonagall, gesturing towards the scene, where two rainbow girls were wreaking havoc in the hall, students in disarray and their Head Girl charging around like a maniac, flashing stars.
"Professor! I'm so sorry!" she gasped out, running towards her. "I can't do anything! It was Potter! I – AAAAAHHHHH!"
She screamed as she kicked the professor out of her chair, causing her to land in a lump on the ground. She then ran to Professor Flitwick and gave his chair an almighty kick, completely stubbing her toes but still able to make the little figure go flying across the hall and onto the Ravenclaw table where he managed to levitate himself before landing into a bowl of porridge. Next was the rather rotund Potions Master, Slughorn, not only did she throw him off his chair; she gave him several good blows while he was on the ground. She dreaded what would happen to her grades.
The entire hall was in chaos. Their usually prim, respected Head Girl was running around teachers with wind milling arms and kicking them off their seats, usually kicking more unpopular teachers in a few less than pleasant places as well, in particular, male teachers, all the while screeching apologies and glowing an interesting mustard colour with a checker pattern. Her two best friends -who were equally gaudy- were on the Gryffindor table, stepping on food as one sang a horrible childish and painfully high-pitched song while the other acted like… well, like a teapot. Students, especially three certain boys were howling with laughter.
"I'm so sorry, Professor! It's Potter, I tell you! It's-"
"-here's my handle, and here's my-"
"Crap! Taylor! You just stomped on my bacon!"
"-Spo-hooouuuuuuut!"
"Miss Evans! What is the meaning of this? Miss Rose and Miss Lee! Get off the – ARGH!" And a resonating thump sounded when that particular professor landed across the hall.
Above them, beside the words that Peter had put up earlier on, was what seemed to be a score.
'Marauders: 2
Idiot Girl Amateurs: 1
Obvious who the winner's gonna be, eh?'
(A/N This includes the Babbling Bile and all the earlier pranks, kay?)
"-A little teapot short and sta-hoooo-oouuuuuut! He-"
"Please forgive me, Professor! I really didn't mean to-"
"That'll teach you to mess with the Marauders!"
"For goodness' sake Taylor! Get your foot out of my porridge!"
Needless to say, breakfast was quite and eventful occasion that day, ending with the three girls being carted off to hospital wing, Andrea still singing strains of the song here and there and Lily still lashing out wildly. The Marauders, with the exception of Remus, received two weeks worth of detention. (Much to the delight of a certain Sirius Black whose idea of leaving a mark was getting the most detentions the school had ever seen.) They also lost their house 70 points, but 10 points were discreetly added by the Defense against the Dark Arts professor, who happened to be impressed by their curses.
A/N: Erm… what d'you think? Oh good lord… I'm not sure whether this was up to your expectations or not… Well, if you're wondering why the heck it took me so long to update, this chapter was kinda hard to write. I'm not sure about the symbol of Lily and her friends, because I wanted them to leave behind a mark after every prank, so I just grabbed the only idea I had (that was suggested by kit21… Oh well… Gah! I never knew that it would be this difficult to describe everything! Oh, by the way, the part about Lily kicking the teachers? That idea came from Devina! Oh yeah, and the whole Taylor's Chinese name things, there are those kinda things, I mean, I have one myself.
EVERYBODY STOP FOR A FEW MOMENTS! In case you're wondering why I'm suddenly screeching like a deluded idiot, I want all of you to take a few seconds to remember Sirius Black. The mischievous, handsome devil he was, loved by all (well… maybe not all… everyone did think he was a murderer.) and doing so much for Harry. Let's pray that he'll play a great role in the fame of Harry Potter. To Sirius/ Padfoot/ Snuffles. (bows head.)
Oh yeah, I almost forgot. What do you think is up with the Bloody Baron? I think that probably the fact that they never mentioned how he got covered with blood is important, and the bartender in Hogs Head too.
Anyway, that's all for now! I still find long reviews exceedingly encouraging, and am still searching for suitable pranks! How long d'you think the prank war should go on? Through the ball during Christmas? Before? How many Chapters? Your opinion matters! Because, there's still a part of the story after the whole war.
Well… REVIEW!