I was really hesitating with this bit of the plot.. as I know how very significant pranks are to every Marauder fic. It's a bit daunting really, as there are some very well-written "prank chapters" out there!
Anyhoo... credits: To You, first and foremost. Thank you for still being here, and I know I say that every chapter.. but really much appreciation on this end. :)
To the movie Parent Trap, (yes I know, odd..) where I got the initial idea of the prank from. And with regards to the prank... apologies for basically just yanking the riddle off DH. I tried to come up with something myself... but Rowena's riddles are both of a philosophical nature (i.e. phoenix before flame) where numerous right answers could be argued, and principally concern magic. It was difficult... I might come up with something in the future, but for now I'll go with the one from DH. I know, I wimped out. I'm really sorry.
I own nothing you recognize!
"Alright then, Gents!" beckoned James eagerly from the foot of the long staircase that connected the Boys Dormitory to the Gryffindor common room, his face split into a wide grin, "The coast is clear!"
"Well, of course it's bloody clear," Remus exploded from behind Sirius's shoulder, unable to smother yet another loud yawn from behind his sleeve, "It's ruddy three AM in the morning!"
"Well then!" James exclaimed indignantly, his brown eyes widening to produce an expression of mock disapproval, "Looks like somebody woke up on the wrong side of their arse," he tut-tutted.
Remus rolled his eyes.
Sirius, and Peter snickered accordingly.
"Care to enlighten me on why we had to start this prank on such an ungodly hour?" Remus asked mid-yawn, his eyes looking distinctly glassy as he followed Sirius down the stairs,
"For the very reason you've just stated, Moony!" James answered matter-of-factly, adjusting his thick, wire-rimmed glasses so that he could shoot them each a very appreciative glance,
"And that is?"
"Well, like you said, this is an 'ungodly' hour—had to make sure everyone of them bleedin' ravens is dead to the world before we make our move! Can't have anyone bursting in where they're not wanted,"
"I suppose I see your point…" Remus admitted ruefully.
"As much as I enjoy these charming preliminaries," Sirius broke in, disentangling the Marauder's map rather inelegantly from his robe pocket, "Best be moving!"
Whipping out his wand, Sirius tapped the empty face of the map lightly, uttering in a voice almost shaky with excitement, "I-solemnly-swear-that-I-am-up-tonogood!"
It was as though the tip of Sirius's wand had been spitting ink: black, weeping lines twined in, and around eachother like shrubbery, connecting, and never separating, until the parchment was almost entirely occupied with dark markings.
James scanned the map immediately for Douglas's name, not surprised to find it quite still on a particular spot situated in the Ravenclaw common room.
"Under the cloak, then!" ushered James as he quickly draped himself with the Invisibility Cloak, under which he was shortly joined by Sirius, Remus, and Peter, all of whom began to look rather amused at the sight of what looked like their decapitated ankles, and feet.
"Blimey!" Peter muttered, looking very much astonished as he fingered the bit of the cloak that fluttered above his head delicately as though in awe, "Bit smaller than I remembered it!"
"Coming from you, Wormtail," Sirius began in a low whisper, almost having to kneel to keep Peter hidden in plain sight, "That says an awful lot."
Peter frowned.
"Oi!" Peter suddenly let out in a shuddering gasp that tousled Sirius's hair, "There's seems to be a hitch in this little plan of yours!"
Although James thought this to be simply ridiculous, impossible, strictly out of the question, hitch indeed, he ceased his eager march to the Portrait hole, and shot Peter a complaisant smile,
"And what would that be, Wormtail?"
"How are we to get in if we don't know the bleeding password?"
James lips broadened like a stain, and raising his finger at them, he pronounced, "Ah! But you see I did my research!"
Remus nearly choked on Peter's hair.
"This is a historical moment!"
James chose to ignore this little slight.
"You see, Wormtail, you have to answer a riddle to get in! Which is why we have-"
"Me for," Remus finished ironically, smiling a little before fashioning a look of pretend-hurt, "And here I thought you brought me along because you enjoyed my company!"
"That too, Moony," Sirius laughed, climbing out of the portrait hole after James, "That too."
Examining the map briefly under his raised wand, James was relieved to learn that Filch, and Norris were nowhere near any of the corridors, and passageways that led to, and went away from the West-end towers.
"Alright, follow me!" James pressed.
For what seemed like almost an hour, the four of them slogged past narrowly twisting corridors, and poorly lit passageways, their backs stooped, and their knees hunched painfully into a stiff curl, each of them often stepping on one another's toes, or otherwise ending up with a mouthful of someone's hair in their face whenever James felt uncertain, and paused to check the map again, making sure they were going the right way.
Sirius had just been in the middle of accusing Peter of apparently snogging the back of his neck, when James spied a tall, beautiful spiral stairway marking the end of the long corridor they had entered.
"I was not snogging your neck! I'd bloody blow chunks first!" Peter actually spat, as though his point needed further stressing,
"Margaret Dodge said the exact same thing to me about two nights ago, and I don't suppose this hickey materialized out of nowhere-"
"I do recall the gigantic boil you gave yourself in first year when you tried to convince us that Matilda Stewart from seventh year gave you a-"
"It was not a boil, Moony! It was just an unfortunately hideous hickey is all," snapped Sirius, truly astonished that Remus had been unable to realize this, "Technique does matter!"
"If you three are done," James called at them, already half-way up the stairway, cloak stowed away neatly beneath his robes,
Shaking his head at Remus's silliness, Sirius bolted after James while Peter anxiously fished for strands of Sirius's hair from his tongue, genuinely terrified that someone would actually suspect him of having snogged the back of his friend's neck.
To the boys' horror, the stairway was roughly the height of about forty giraffes. It was seemingly endless, winding up in a series of increasingly tight, and suffocating circles that made James's brain turn with it by the time he had reached the upper landing, panting furiously, his hands clutching the balls of his knees.
"Bloody hell, Prongs, these stairs are giving me a damn headache!" grumbled Sirius, with all the superior petulance of a child who was accustomed to getting whatever they wanted,
"And would somebody please be kind enough to carry Wormtail?" Sirius added gravely, gesturing a wild arm at Peter who was lagging a good four steps behind him, breathing heavily, the thin, almost colorless hair dripping wet, the sallow skin a sickly yellow with exhaustion, "Poor bloke looks like he's about to have a bleeding heart-attack!"
"Product, I think," Remus wheezed, "Of all those nightly visits to kitchen! Don't think I haven't notice you packing on a bit-"
"I-I digest food faster than most people!" whined Peter, a furious blush rising to join the waxy yellow on his small, pointed face.
"Something a woman will appreciate in the future, I'm sure," Sirius snorted, quickly latching on to James's shoulder for support whilst behind him, Peter cried sharply, "Well, it doesn't appear that all that snogging has gotten you anywhere!"
"It's gotten me in Eloise Mitchell's and back, I'll have you know," Sirius sneered, winking, his hand extended kindly to Remus who took it gratefully, albeit with a sickened expression planted on his face that had strictly nothing to do with the stairs,
"Merlin, I thought Eloise was a nice girl!" Remus shook his head, apparently very disappointed with Eloise, and then, turning to face the entrance, he muttered, "Their porthole I expect, but there doesn't appear to be a doorknob,"
"There is a knocker though!" James pointed immediately to a small, bronze knocker that had been fashioned into the shape of a flying raven.
Swallowing a little, James lifted the knocker slowly, and then... shutting his eyes, he slammed it hard against the knob-less door, a noise not so different from a reverberating explosion greeting them once he did.
"Blimey!" Sirius shouted, throwing his arms immediately over his scrunched up face.
Then they heard something after that caused James's freehand to instantly jump to the back of his hair.
"Where do vanished objects go?" The voice was distinctly a woman's, faintly musical, and exquisitely deep.
"I like her," Sirius elbowed Remus, grinning wide.
At the question, Remus fell instantly silent, appearing to be in deep thought, his jaw clenching, and unclenching with strenuous calculation, as it often did whenever he considered how best to start a fifteen-feet essay.
"Everywhere, as with non-existence," Remus finally conceded, crossing his arms with a small hopeful look on his face.
"Well-reasoned," the beautiful voice murmured, and the door swung open like an arm gesturing one to enter.
"Don't look now, Moony, but I think the knocker fancies you," Sirius teased sweetly, wiggling his dark eyebrows at Remus in suggestion, whilst James, naturally eavesdropping, looked over his shoulder, and laughed.
"I must say, she's a real catch, that knocker—lovely voice and all," James put in, clapping a congratulatory hand on Remus's shoulder, "It's just a right pity that I've banged her as well,"
Remus tapped one foot loudly in admonition as James and Sirius nearly doubled up in a smothered fit of laughter,
"Just because they're asleep," hissed Remus, a prominent vein in his neck constricting, "Doesn't mean their dead,"
"Sorry, Moony," James managed to puff in a voice weak with laughter, "Couldn't help it."
In front of them, Sirius stood quite still, his hands set high on his hips as though he were posing for a portrait,
"Mates! (here Sirius paused for effect) It's bloody time we took out the trash."
James, Remus, and Peter shot him a withering glance.
"Padfoot, really," James frowned, appalled at his friend's childish behavior, "How many times do we have to tell you to stop making any more motivational one-liners!"
"Fine, you bloody tossers," Sirius sulked, pushing his pale lips into a fat pout as he swiftly followed James, Remus, and Peter on their quick ascend to what they all hoped was the boy's dormitory.
They came across another empty landing, this time, with several closed doors. James crept quietly towards the one that was labeled exactly like theirs in the Gryffindor common room: Seventh-years.
Pushing a finger to his lips, James took out his wand, twisting the brass doorknob gently behind him. The knob gave a soft, lingering click, and the door opened quite easily when James chanced to set a careful foot beyond it.
The dormitory was filled with the sound of many people snoring softly, a pale, bluish light streaming into the large room from the high, round windows that were a common feature on every wall.
In the near darkness, James spotted Douglas easily on the bed to his left, Douglas's long, gaunt face lying comfortably on one side, rising and falling steadily with his muffled breath, his stomach flat against the strewn bed sheets, his pale feet dangling off the edge.
James nodded to Remus at once, who dutifully lifted his wand, and knit his eyebrows as though in deep concentration.
A pair of fat, red earmuffs suddenly appeared over Douglas's head.
Quick at work, Sirius yanked the blankets off Douglas's back. He tossed them unceremoniously to the floor, taking care to wipe the bottom of his shoes on them before joining Remus and Peter silently by the moonlit doorway.
His brow cut in concentration, James fluidly brandished his wand, his mind ringing forcefully with, "Wingardium Leviosa!"
As though an invisible pack of house-elves had raised him into the air, Douglas rose instantly from his bed, his long arms hanging eerily over James as though with the secret wish of throttling him.
With James helplessly at the rear, and Peter serving watch at the front, the four of them slowly exitted the Ravenclaw common room.
For the most part, Sirius had to hold James stiffly by the shoulders to keep his friend from tripping all over himself, so nervous he was, or falling over the occasional stuffy armchair in his haste. James, and this was crucial, had to keep his eyes on Douglas entirely: if Douglas so much as rubbed up against the wall accidentally, James thought with a twisting colon, they were all done for.
The circular staircase, in particular, was, as Sirius had pointed out unnecessarily to James on the way down, "absolute murder."
At one point, James—with his eyes apparently still fixed on Douglas—had actually missed a step on the way down, and promptly tripping on his school robes in what closely resembled a lopsided pirouette, had practically catapulted himself into the unknowing arms of Sirius, where in a second, he was roughly joined by a heavy Douglas, who, thank Merlin, found Sirius apparently cushy enough that there appeared to be no protest.
Finally reaching the delicious cool of the moonlit grounds, Sirius ran to assist both Remus and Peter with one of the small boats ordinarily employed by the school to carry stunned, wide-eyed first-years to the castle.
The boat that they had indiscriminately selected was still dripping with the black paint they had used hours earlier to write SS ARSEMONGER, in thick, weepy letters on the side.
Taking a huge gulp of air, James lowered Douglas earnestly into the boat; feet first, with the head last.
With barely stifled snickers, the four of them wrenched the boat carelessly to the water's edge, leaving deep, gouging drag marks on the pristine grass.
"Padfoot," prompted James, Remus, and Peter all together with large, identical smiles on their faces once they've reached the rippling water's edge, drenched completely in sweat, but blissful regardless.
"What is it you sods?"
Sirius happily swept the illuminated hair out of his eyes, his handsomeness pronounced easily by the intimate light of the three-quarter moon.
"It's bloody time we took out the trash."