a/n-contrary to popular belief, we are alive. however, since-as An-Jelly-Ca pointed out-we only have one hand left of days of summer vacation before school starts, we shall most likely die soon. and do i need a pen name and An-Jelly-Ca are so tired right now that's going to be our inspiring author's note for the update. enjoy! oh yeah, and please review!

Disclaimer-We don't own Harry Potter or Jell-O.

Chapter Seven

Scheduling Cheering Charms for the last day of class before term hadn't been one of his brightest moves and as a Ravenclaw, Flitwick couldn't help but wince at the sheer stupidity of the action. Admittedly, he had never had something like this occur when teaching the charm before so it wasn't to be expected—the worst that had ever happened was a couple of kids needing to be kept in a quiet room for a few hours while they calmed down. And so Flitwick had assumed that the lesson would go over fine. In retrospect, he probably should have taken into consideration who the particular members of the class were cough—Sirius, James, Marlene—cough. Alas, he had failed to do so, and as a result the monstrosity that is an overly cheerful Sirius was unleashed upon the poor unsuspecting Hogwartians that fateful Friday.

In order to truly imagine the horrors that poor Professor Flitwick suffered, we shall need to go back to the terrifying lesson:

Several Hours Earlier

It was the last day of classes before term ended and the Marauders were all to be found sequestered in their Charms classroom practicing Cheering Charms, which Flitwick had hinted were very likely going to be on their exams come June.

"Alright, class I'd like you to split up into pairs—or rather, I'll split you into pairs…" Flitwick stated trailing off as he recalled the horrible things that had occurred the last time he had allowed a class containing the Marauders to pick their own partners…let's just say it's a mistake he won't be repeating anytime soon. "Let's see…maybe some inter-house partnerships?" He asked.

His own students—the Ravenclaws, that is—all groaned aloud in horror at the idea of practicing a charm that would be on their exams with Gryffindors. Especially with Gryffindors like Sirius, James, and Marlene who didn't seem to care much for school; or Merlin-forbid Peter who well, just wasn't very gifted when it came to charms and was more than likely to end up setting his partner on fire.

"Anyway, Black you're with Hopkirk, McKinnon you're with Dearborn, Lupin and Keily, MacDonald with Quigley, Pettigrew with Sinistra, Mr. Fabian Prewett with Shingleton, Mr. Gideon Prewett with Vance, Ms. Alice Prewett with Vector." Flitwick quickly ran through the inter-house partnerships before looking around at the remaining students, "It seems that we have more Gryffindors than Ravenclaws, let's see we'll put Meadows with Fenwick, Potter with Evans, and it seems that there is no partner left for you, Longbottom, which means you will have the privilege of practicing cheering charms with me." Flitwick finished, resolutely ignoring the gasp of horror, which came from Lily Evans' direction.

"It had to be Potter, didn't it?" Lily hissed at her best friend, Mary MacDonald. Mary never got a chance to respond as Marlene, having heard Lily's comment, jumped in before she had the chance.

"I don't understand why you're so mean to James," Marlene said with a frown. "James is really quite nice you know. And, I think you'd really like him if you'd get to know him." The ginger-haired girl finished before leaving behind a confused looking Lily and heading over to join Caradoc Dearborn who was to be her partner for Cheering Charms. On her way, she passed Sirius, hitting the back of his head as she did so, as he appeared to be sleeping on his desk while his partner began working on the assigned charm.

"Take this seriously, Black!" Mafalda Hopkirk demanded glaring at the Gryffindor boy, who was looking around blearily, clearly trying to figure out how he had come to be sitting next to the Ravenclaw girl and not James. "Professor Flitwick said this was going to be on the exams."

"My dear Maffie, I do assure you that I am always Sirius. In fact you will probably never meet another person who is as Sirius as I am." Sirius replied grinning at the Ravenclaw girl who was evidently not amused by his puns.

"First of all, do NOT call me that horrid nickname, I have no idea what would give you the idea that I would enjoy being called "Maffie," which sounds very much like the type of name someone would give to their pet niffler, and rather unlike the name of a studious young lady such as myself." Mafalda said sternly. "Furthermore, as much as I enjoy your cheesy puns," The look on her face seemed to indicate that she thought the exact opposite, but I digress. "We need to get to work on cheering charms. Now."

"Why didn't you just say so, Maffie? We'll get started right away!" Sirius exclaimed. The girl fought the urge to bang her head repeatedly against the nearest hard surface and nodded her acquiescence.

"A bene placito!"

The girl was rather angry by this point, and thus said the charm with rather more force then was strictly necessary, and the results? Well, let's just say they weren't pretty. However, we shall get to those unfortunate circumstances later, in the meantime, let's see how some of the other students are fairing…

The Potter-Evans partnership was not going well, not at all. In fact, it was perhaps the only partnership in the room doing worse then the Black-Hopkirk grouping.

One half of the group was busily staring up at the ceiling as though asking "Why, are you doing this to me, God?" And, can we be certain that Miss Evans was asking that particular question? Because Lily was also busy screaming that particular phrase to the ceiling whilst James employed himself by singing her a love song. And, unfortunately, James didn't sing well (in other words he sounded rather like a cat in a blender.)

"Potter," Lily began, finally having gathered up the strength of mind to stop screaming at the ceiling and address the boy currently 'serenading' her. "Have some dignity, stop your screeching and let's practice cheering charms, shall we?"

"Anything for you, my most darling Lilyflower."

"A bene placito!" Lily intoned flicking her wand at just the right angle so as to administer the charm perfectly.

James immediately became cheerful to the point where Lily was almost afraid to be in his presence. And to her great misfortune, the cheering charm seemed to also have bolstered his confidence and he had begun to recite a rather terrible love poem at the top of his lungs.

She so should've stayed in bed this morning.

Marlene, on the other hand, would have liked to stay in bed as late as possible every single morning, if she could. However, as she approached the desk where her assigned partner was seated, she decided that perhaps today she wasn't going to regret her loss of sleep too much.

"Caradoc!" Marlene said excitedly, her eyes lighting up at the sight of the Ravenclaw boy. With a startled jump, he turned around, his wand up in front of him in defense, a move that was often a wise decision when Marlene was involved. "How are you doing on this fine Friday afternoon? Charming, I'm sure. Say, Caradoc, has anyone ever told you that you're name sort of sounds like the word 'carrot?'" She gasped, her eyes widening further than was probably possible for a normal human being. "And your last name is Dearborn. Do you like deer, Caradoc? Do you? Do you? Do you? Huh? Huh? Huh? Ooh…have you ever fed carrots to a deer? Well, have you?"

This onslaught came as what sounded like a jumble of words to poor Caradoc Dearborn's ears. Indeed, the only possible way he could find to answer the girl before him, who was acting slightly maniacal, was to stare at her helplessly, his wand still pointed before him. Just then, Professor Flitwick chose that moment to begin walking around the classroom, the better to observe the students' progress.

"Well done, Mr. Dearborn!" Flitwick said proudly in his high-pitched voice. "This is a most excellent display of the Cheering Charm upon Miss McKinnon. Well done, indeed."

And without further word, the professor walked away to go check the progress of another group, unfortunately leaving behind a rather flabergasted Caradoc Dearborn still in the company of Marlene, who had yet to actually be put under the influence of a Cheering Charm. There had never been a time before this—and Caradoc highly doubted there would be a time after this, unless he was ever paired with Marlene again—that he regretted being a Ravenclaw. In fact, right now, and he shuddered to even think it, he would rather be a Hufflepuff, and most likely incapable of further affecting Marlene's already high level of cheerfulness.

Now, Peter Pettigrew and his partner, Aurora Sinistra were having a similar yet altogether different problem from Caradoc. Aurora, like Caradoc, was a Ravenclaw, although she, unlike her housemate, did not regret it for an instant. Peter, on the other hand, was a Gryffindor who had a lower skill level than even a Hufflepuff. So Aurora, with this very knowledge in hand, offered to let Peter attempt a Cheering Charm first, as it would make her inevitably successful charm look so much better in the eyes of Professor Flitwick who appeared to be headed in their general direction. She had underestimated the harm Peter could do, however, with his lack of skill in performing even the most rudimentary of magical skill work.

Peter stood a few feet away from Aurora, his wand held out before with a spastically shaking arm.

"Ah bean placktico." Peter stuttered, and it was in the moment just before the spell hit her that Aurora truly realized how very unwise it was to even be in the same country as Peter Pettigrew let alone agree to attend the same school.

"You idiot!" Aurora shouted angrily at Peter, taking a few steps forward and sticking her wand out so that it was touching right in between his eyebrows. "You said the spell all wrong. It's supposed to be 'A bene placito' not whatever nonsense came out of your unworthy mouth."

Peter had slowly been shrinking away in fear from the young witch, all the while thinking that Sirius and James had tricked him yet again. It was Ravenclaws you should be afraid of, apparently, not Slytherins. But as soon as Aurora uttered to correct pronunciation of the spell he had so easily fumbled, he found himself to be much too senselessly happy to be even remotely worried about her extreme anger with him. In fact, in his current state, he found that he rather liked her hair in the hue of purple it had suddenly become, and found that he would quite like to sing about just that shade of purple, though he had no idea why, as he was in no way musically inclined.

Now Remus, unlike the vast majority of his classmates, had no problem with the inter-house partnerships. Aiden Keily was the average Ravenclaw student, meaning that he was exceedingly intelligent not to mention very studious. It had taken them both only around ten minutes to perform the charm on each other and they both did it to just the right degree so that the only effect was a slight increase in cheerfulness, rather highly unlike what was going on several feet away from them.

"Oh, no." Remus muttered, knowing that he should be feeling more distressed by what he was witnessing but the effects of the cheering charm rendered him unable to feel more then infinitesimally discomfited.

"What is it?" Aiden asked.

"Do you see that?" Remus inquired gesturing across the room to where Sirius was.

"...Isn't that your friend?"

"Unfortunately, yes."

And, what, do you ask was the sight which had poor Remus so horrified? Well, if you must know it was the image of one Sirius Black laughing maniacally in the center of the room and running in circles. You should know that this in and of itself was not odd behavior for one Sirius Black. The problem was that he was running around shouting various charms which did things like turned people's hair various colors and/or caused them to sing every time they spoke, and keep in mind few of these students were good singers. And, to make matters worse Sirius had managed to levitate poor Professor Flitwick on top of a large cabinet, and had sent his wand in the opposite direction. Remus was further mortified when he glanced several feet to the left and spotted James serenading a rather irate looking Lily (her eye was beginning to twitch, and it was anyone's guess as to when she would snap and hex him).

"Stop that this instant, Sirius Black!" Remus commanded.

Said boy seemed rather disinclined to cooperate and instead glanced around the room, decided he had wreaked enough havoc in the Charms classroom and with a hand gesture to Marlene indicating she should join him ran out the classroom door off to spread mayhem among other unsuspecting Hogwartians. Upon seeing that Professor Flitwick was too busy attempting to fix the damage Sirius had done to notice another student exiting the classroom, Remus heaved a rather put upon sigh and decided that it was his obligation to chase after his aforementioned friends.

Lily, too, was quick to take advantage of the professor's distraction and practically ran Aurora Sinistra over in her attempt to escape James, who only followed her out of the classroom at a sprint. Now Aurora, being the good Ravenclaw that she was and taking into account her current altered state of mind, was quite enraged at the actions of all of these Gryffindors who appeared to not value the educational system as much as she did. And so she saw no other alternative but to follow them out of the classroom so as to make sure they did not disrupt the learning environment of the rest of the castle.

Once he had exited the Charms classroom, Remus could not immediately tell which way Sirius and Marlene had gone. However, it didn't take much time at all to deduce in which direction the pair had disappeared in. It was just as the bell for lunch rang and students began crowding the hallways that he heard Sirius' maniacal laughter on his right. As Remus attempted to push his way through the crowds (and failed miserably, as he was only a first year) he realized that he was heading in the same direction as everyone else: towards the Great Hall. This was not going to end well.

By the time Remus reached the Great Hall, most of the student population of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry was already inside. Of course, he could only tell this, because that was about how many people had stood in between him and his quest to stop Sirius and Marlene. However, he could not hear anything from within the Hall; it was strangely silent. The people surrounding him seemed not to notice, though, and walked right in, and as they did so there was a strange squishing sound to break the silence.

Cautiously Remus took a few steps so that he was standing in the doorway to the Hall. The site that met his eyes was a strange one. The Great Hall looked just as it should have: tables, benches, students, and all…yet everything was red. No, not red, it looked as if Remus was looking through a red screen at the room before him. Still cautiously, he reached his arm forward and poked the screen. It wiggled when he did so.

"Jell-O." Remus muttered. Someone—And Remus knew exactly who—had filled the Great Hall with Jell-O. Red Jell-O.

"Jell-O!" A loud voice echoed from behind the sandy-haired first year.

Jumping at the sound, Remus turned to see Sirius and Marlene standing there.

"Why is there Jell-O everywhere, Sirius?" Remus asked slowly.

"I told you he would notice it without you shouting it to the whole world, Siri." Marlene stated.

"Details." Sirius said with a wave of his hand, before turning back to Remus. "It's not everywhere, Remmie. That's just a wall blocking the door for people to walk through."

"And they don't notice it at all?" Remus questioned dubiously.

"It's an invisible wall." Marlene clarified with a slightly crazed grin.

Remus was unable to ask how he was able to see said invisible wall of red Jell-O, however, because just at that moment, Lily Evans chose to make her entrance into the Entrance Hall.

"Save me!" She cried, running straight to Remus and grabbing the front of his robes. "Your crazy friend is insane! Get him away from me or I'm going to get a restraining order!"

"Oh my Lilykins!" James' voice could be heard from the top of the marble staircase. "Where did you go, my precious flower?"

"I'm not your anything, Potter!" Lily hollered. "Now leave me alone or I'll get McGonagall."

"Minnie!" Sirius said, his face lighting up. "Keep bothering her Jamsie, I want Minnie to come! I haven't seen her since forever and a year!"

Remus narrowed his eyes suspiciously at his friend. "Don't you always say that whenever anyone mentions Professor McGonagall?"

"Maybe." Sirius replied mysteriously.

"YOU!" A voice suddenly shouted.

James, who by now was halfway down the staircase, jumped in surprise, causing him to fall the rest of the way down. The other four Gryffindors in the hall, three of who were his close friends, ignored the falling boy in favor of looking to seeing whom it was who was causing such a ruckus in the hallways. To say they were surprised to see first year Ravenclaw Aurora Sinistra standing there with a red face and looking half-crazed and pointing one finger in Sirius' direction would be a bit of an understatement, however.

"You." Aurora said again, though this time with a deadly calm as she stalked down the staircase still pointing at Sirius. "How dare you."

"How dare I what, my darling Roman goddess?" Sirius asked her pleasantly, ignoring the death glare she was clearly directing towards him.

"How dare you disturb these hallowed halls of learning? You're making a mockery of an education that would clearly do you some good. And I just won't stand for it anymore!" Aurora stated with vehemence.

"You know what you need, oh lovely nighttime spectacle?" Sirius asked. "I think you need a hug—and some happy time. And it's all very arrangeable; I can give you a nice pamphlet about it, if you want."

"'Arrangeable' isn't a real word." Remus muttered under his breath.

"Immagazzinare." Aurora said suddenly, but softly enough that no one could hear her due to her distance from them.

"Ow!" Sirius yelped, clutching his side. "Mars, why'd you poke me? You know I'll give you a pamphlet, too. No need to get violent about it."

"Immagazzinare." The Ravenclaw said again, this time causing Sirius to grab his other side. And then, "Solleticare." Which caused Sirius to erupt into laughter.

"What are you doing to him you crazy, school-obsessed, smart person?" Marlene demanded, finally realizing that it was Aurora behind Sirius' strange behavior…well, not that it was really any stranger than usual, but still.

"I'm giving him what he deserves!" Aurora announced, a crazed gleam in her eyes. Her gaze then fell upon the entrance to the Great Hall, causing her eyes to widen.

"Don't even think about." Marlene warned the other girl, but alas, it was too late to warn the usually studious Ravenclaw of the side effects of using magic on the Jell-O, which apparently was no longer invisible.

"Agito!" Aurora cried, flicking her wand from the red substance towards Sirius.

As soon as the Jell-O made contact with Sirius, a sudden change came over the hall. First, it became flooded with the sounds of the Hogwarts population eating lunch. The other thing it became flooded with, however, was red Jell-O.

"I tried to warn you!" Marlene cried as the Jell-O appeared to multiply before their very eyes, lifting them off of their feet and spilling into the Great Hall where it had the same effect on the unsuspecting Hogwartians eating their lunch. "It expands if you use magic on it!"

"You know, my precious Lilykins," James began, "This delectable red treat is nothing compared to the beautiful sheen of your red hair."

"Jell-O!" Sirius cried happily, saving Lily the pain of having to answer him.

And that was the scene that met Professor Flitwick's eyes as he finally made it to the Entrance Hall. Right then and there he promised himself that he would never again teach another practical lesson in any of his classes with the Marauders ever again. However, this was probably not the wisest decision, as he rather valued having a job, so he would just have to settle for pairing the Marauders and McKinnon with each other so as to avoid harming any other students.

Nevertheless, Hogwarts would never again be the same, those five would see to that.

a/n-just for the record, neither of us have ever fed carrots to deer, but do i need a pen name's sister did get attacked by a deer once when she didn't give it food. that's cheerful, isn't it? anyway, please review! You guys are the best!