Warning: Mild swearing ahead. There will probably not be much after this chapter, but it seemed necessary.

Back to the Marauders' Era

Chapter Two

Bad Fanfiction of the Worst Degree

~"Clichés can be quite fun. That's how they got to be clichés."~

-Alan Bennett

The realisation hit me like a ton of bricks. I was actually in a story. A Fanfiction. One of the ones I had read and laughed at.

No. No. No.

This was bad. This was very bad. How was this even possible? In fact, it was completely impossible! And yet, it all made sense.

Shit.

How was I going to get out? I needed to get back to my mum! My friends! My home! My nice, imperfect body! It might have flaws, but it was my own. What if I could never get out? But I didn't want this!

When I thought about it, the automatic replies from before made sense now. The author had been scripting my replies; I was just a character.

Oh my gosh. Oh my fucking goodness, what the crap hell shit am I going to do?!

Beside me, the three marauders were cracking lame jokes like I wasn't having a complete internal meltdown. I wanted to yell at them, to shake them until they told me how to get out of here, how to get home, but the author seemed to have other plans for me.

"I don't think you introduced yourself." I said with another melodic giggle, even though I knew perfectly well who they were.

I internally winced at my voice, except… it wasn't my voice. I hadn't noticed so far, mostly because I hadn't been paying attention, but it was higher pitched than my real voice. It sounded slightly melodic, like I always sang what I said. Urgh. Who even wants to sound like that?

"I'm Sirius Black." Sirius introduced himself. He gave me a knee-weakening smile that I couldn't bring myself to return.

"I'm James Potter, and that's Remus Lupin." James said pointing at himself and Remus. I almost considered myself lucky that the author was controlling me, as otherwise I would probably have collapsed and started bawling like a three-year-old.

Wait a moment.

The author was controlling me! I could no longer decide what I was going to say, or do! If I hadn't been panicking before, I certainly was now. I would have begun hyperventilating, but, as I had realised, I had no control over my movements.

As we continued walking down the narrow corridor of the train, peering into the compartments and looking for somewhere to sit, the small part of my mind that wasn't completely panicking decided to explore my new predicament. Now, given something to focus on other than my current situation, I calmed down for a moment (although I didn't doubt that I would be panicking again later).

So, what did you do during the summer? I formulated the thought clearly in my mind and desperately tried to get the words out. However, my mouth wasn't cooperating, and I continued smiling a stupid, little smile. I felt like screaming. Next, I desperately tried to move my hand. To my surprise, my hand lifted and stroked my soft, silky hair, just as I had wanted. I narrowed my eyes, and it surprised me that I could do that, as well. However, none of the marauders seemed to notice that I was no longer paying any attention to their dim-witted banter that the author had come up with.

Finally, I had something to concentrate on other than the fact that I was… No. I forced myself to not think about my situation, in case I fell back into panic-mode.

I stroked my chin thoughtfully, my body still cooperating. Then, I tried to move my hand to scratch my bum. Nope, didn't work. However, when I tried to move my fingers, they all seemed to function correctly.

Hm. Interesting.

It seemed that as long as I didn't do anything that interfered with the plot of the author, I could move my body as I wished. However, I could not do anything that specifically went against the plan of the author, such as walk away from the boys.

I was jolted back into reality when the boys stopped suddenly. In my own body, I would probably have (mortifyingly) crashed into them had they stopped at such short notice. Now, however, I gracefully came to a halt behind them.

How I wish I was back in my clumsy, flawed body.

It seemed the boys had found a compartment for us to sit in. It was empty, with only a red-headed girl (who I guessed was Lily Evans) sitting in it and reading.

She was pretty, but not as unnaturally beautiful as the four people I had met so far. In fact, I had noticed that – except the marauders (minus Peter, who had yet to make an appearance) and Snape – everybody we had come across so far was a little above average in appearance, but not too much so. The marauders' were the only ones so freakishly good looking, and, to a slightly lesser degree, Snape.

Once again, I was jolted out of my thoughts when Lily noticed that she was no longer alone and looked up at us.

"What do you want?" She asked, sneering slightly.

"Well, Lilyflower-" James started.

"Don't call me that." She interrupted.

"There aren't any other free compartments, so it looks like you'll have to put up with us for now." He finished with a wink.

Huh. That wasn't even so bad. I thought, having expected the awkward flirting that usually occurred between Lily and James in bad stories.

"Your eyes are as beautiful as the stars." He said, sliding into the seat beside her.

Oh, there it is. I winced, but nobody seemed to notice. It was quiet for a moment after we all sat down. Sirius looked suspiciously like he was eyeing my chest, Remus had taken out his own book and begun to read and James was running a hand through his unnaturally perfect hair.

Wait a moment, that isn't right. Harry inherited his hair from James, meaning that it's supposed to be messy and uncontrollable.

I wondered why such small aspects of stories were bothering me, when the story obviously had such major flaws, but I supposed that I was like that when I read fanfiction at home on my computer; the littlest of things always annoyed me… I felt myself choke up again at the thought of my home and I could feel my eyes prickling.

"Who are you?" Lily suddenly asked, noticing me for the first time.

"Oceane-Elenore Duquette." I replied automatically, in my unnatural, melodic voice and with an equally as irritating laugh. Urgh. What kind of a name is that even?

She raised her eyebrows. "That's a mouthful…"

"You can call me Oceane." I said quickly.

"That's such a beautiful name…" Sirius murmured, his impossible-in-reality silver eyes staring into mine intently.

"Uh, thanks." I replied awkwardly, but he didn't seem to notice my fumble. I was confused for a moment, why hadn't the author plotted my reaction? The one I had given had been completely myself; I had never been good at accepting compliments (mainly because I rarely received them, and, therefore, didn't have much practice).

"Can I speak to you for a second?" Remus asked me quietly, his yellow eyes staring intently at me.

Hang on a minute, he had blue eyes a moment ago!

I tried to remember back to the moment when I had met the marauders to start with and I was pretty certain that his eyes had been blue. Author indecisiveness. I thought with a mental scoff. Always a sign of a badly-written story.

Remembering his question, I nodded and followed him out of the compartment.

"I just wanted to say…" He leaned closer. "I know…."

"Uh, know what?" I asked. I literally had no clue what he was talking about.

"About your… condition." He whispered.

"I… Er… You'll have to elaborate." I finally said, wondering why the author hadn't stepped in yet.

"You are a half-vampire!"

No freaking way. What? WHAT?

"Oh. That." I replied stupidly. Where were the automatic author-replies when I needed them?

So apparently I'm a half-vampire now. This is just great. Not.

"It's just that I know what you're going through… I'm a werewolf, you see."

I felt like banging my head against the wall. Why on earth would he admit that to some random girl he just met? Why? It makes no sense whatsoever. Zero, zilch, nip, nada. I repeated the last part in my head a couple of times in order to refrain from losing my sanity.

"I'm so glad someone knows what it's like!" I gushed after a moment. Yes, gushed. The author had obviously decided to reappear and give me a couple of clichéd responses. Fantastic.

"I know. I'm also so glad you're here." He said. He led me back into the compartment, giving me a quick hug (which was fairly awkward and uncomfortable due to my humongous boobs, but he didn't seem to notice).

"So, what deep conversations did you have?" James asked, winking at Remus suggestively. I would have blushed, but instead I just giggled melodically. Thanks, author.

"Oh, nothing much." Remus said, smiling at me, a friendly gesture that I returned.

Lily turned to me. "So, what house do you think you'll be in?" She asked.

A second realization came crashing down on me. I was actually going to Hogwarts. I was going to learn magic, even if I was a Mary Sue. For that one purpose, it was good, as Mary Sues were usually abnormally gifted at anything they tried, something which worked in my favor during lessons. For the first time since my arrival, I felt happy. In fact, I felt positively giddy at the prospect of finally living the dream of every Harry Potter fan (myself included) and attending Hogwarts.

"Oh, I don't mind." I heard myself say.

"She'll be in Gryffindor, of course." Sirius said, casually slinging an arm around my shoulders.

I gave one of my infamous (for me, at least) melodic giggles and smiled at him.

"If it means I can be with you," I breathed, staring into his impossibly silver eyes. Eugh. Yuck. I cannot believe I just said that. Is the author trying to strip every shred of my dignity?

"That would be the best possible version of reality I can imagine." Sirius murmured.

Is that supposed to be poetic? I really hope not…

He looked at me intensely, stroking a lock of my soft hair out of my face.

I was suddenly insanely aware of everybody else in the compartment. I mean, how awkward was this whole situation? From the corner of my eye, however, I could see that everybody seemed to be minding their own business, not at all aware of this entire exchange.

Even so, I was feeling increasingly uncomfortable with this whole situation. I gave him a smile (I wasn't sure if I had forced myself to do it, or the author) and turned back to the others.

"So, Oceane, what's your favourite subject?" Lily asked me, her green eyes boring into mine.

Honestly, what is it with all these deep, intense looks? Does the author have some sort of look-fetish? Does that even exist?

"I love Potions," I found myself saying, "But personally, I favor all classes."

She nodded, looking significantly friendlier. "I like potions, too. Have you ever tried to brew a Halligran healing concoction?" she asked me, her eyes sparkling slightly.

"No, what's that?" I asked, completely myself speaking. It was honestly refreshing.

"It's a sort of modified version of the normal healing potion, because, by adding more peppermint to it, you can intensify it by a lot!" she told me.

Despite having absolutely no idea what she was talking about, I was starting to really enjoy this conversation.

"Really? That sounds fascinating!" I said.

"And it really works. I love modifying potions so that their power increases or their effect changes, and that's what I'm working on now."

I had just opened my mouth to reply when James cut across what I had been about to say.

"Alright, enough talk about boring stuff." He began, causing my heart to drop. The first conversation that I had actually been enjoying had been put to an abrupt stop. "We need to plan our first marauder prank of the year!" he finished.

Psh. Like they'd be stupid enough to discuss a prank with Lily in the same compartment. Anyway, which year is this? Because she's either prefect, which would make them dumb to talk about it, or… If it's seventh year, James and Lily should be in the prefect's compartment, having their first meeting as head boy and girl! In fact, Lily and Remus should be there as prefects, even if it's not seventh year yet!

As if he had read my mind, James continued gleefully. "And, because it's seventh year, it has to be brilliant! It's our last year here, after all."

So the author chose to disregard the head boy/head girl bit. Alright, creative licence, whatever. My inner rant was cut off by Sirius clapping excitedly. Even his hands looked unrealistically perfect.

"So, as the marauders, it has to be spectacular!"

Suddenly, a thought struck me. "Hang on a moment," I was startled for a moment by my ability to speak out loud. "Where's Peter?"

Three unrealistically handsome faces stared at me, confusion etched into them.

"Who?" Sirius asked carefully.

"Peter. You know? Peter Pettigrew? Wormtail? The fourth member of your group?" I said, starting to get impatient by their clueless looks.

"Um." James looked lost. "I don't really know what you're talking about. We don't know anybody called Peter."

I resisted the urge to groan in despair. So this was one of those stories. I couldn't stand it when authors simply chose to completely disregard Peter. Although I hated what he became as much as anyone, he was still part of their group whilst they were in school, and an important aspect of the marauder's era.

The boys seemed to have already forgotten about our conversation from half a minute ago, and they went back to planning a 'legendary' prank.

"I vote we slime Snivellus!" James said loudly.

Lily stood up so suddenly her book fell to the floor with a thunk. "JAMES POTTER!" She screeched. I resisted covering my ears with my hands (I probably wouldn't have been able to even if I had tried, thanks to the author's control over my body). "I CANNOT BELIEVE YOU!" She yelled with equal volume. "You… You're such a prat. I can't believe I thought you had changed." And with that, she turned and stormed off, slamming the compartment door behind her with a bang.

Hang on a moment. She thought he had changed? But he acted like a prat the entire time we've been here. This makes no sense.

Then again, when did fanfiction of the lesser quality ever make sense?

To clarify: In case you're wondering, whenever Chloe can speak as herself (without automatic answers) in a conversation, is when the author is too lazy to write dialogue, and only writes something like: Lily started talking to Oceane about potions, when James interrupted… I hope everybody kind of understands how the whole her-decision/author's-decision thing works.

Please leave me a review? They really motivate me to write.