Well that took forever to write. I was hoping to relax more, maybe drink some hot chocolate before it got too late. I guess I could still do that. At first I didn't want to write but I did promise so, yeah. Nice long chapter. Enjoy!
"We are not going to cut Severus Snape's hair," Remus said after Sirius explained to them why he needed scissors. They were walking to their next class, Defense Against the Dark Arts.
"We're not going to cut his hair," Sirius said. "I wouldn't want to touch that greasy ball of messiness with a 100 meter pole."
"I wouldn't want to touch it regardless of the pole's length," James added.
"We're going to charm the scissors to follow him around school," Sirius said.
"How are you going to do that?" Peter asked, awed by the fact they could perform such a complicated spell.
"A simple 'following spell' should do the trick," Sirius stated matter-of-factly. Remus rolled his eyes.
"It's only the second day of school," Remus said.
"If we can't find scissors," James said, ignoring Remus. "We can always transfigure something into a pair of scissors."
"I like the way you think Potter," Sirius said, putting his arm around James's shoulders.
"You. Are. First. Years," Remus said, trying to get their attentions. "You can't transfigure an object into another object yet."
"You're ruining our fun," James said, sticking out his tongue.
"Besides," Remus continued, "what has Severus Snape ever done to you to deserve this?"
"You were the one who blew his potion up yesterday!" Sirius said, making Remus sigh.
"I know and I feel horrible about it," Remus said. "I had a lot to think about it last night while I waited to tran- while I waited for news on my mother. How would my mother feel about her only child being a bully."
"You're not a bully," Sirius said. "Snape's deserves what he gets."
"Yeah, you should have heard what he said about Gryffindor on the train," James added.
"Everyone's entitled to their own opinions," Remus said.
"Not about Gryffindor," Sirius said. "We have to defend our house, don't you agree?"
"Yes!" Peter said, raising his fist. Sirius cheered and gave Peter a high-five.
"See, Peter understands," Sirius said. Remus groaned and started walking faster, hoping to have some time to himself. Once arriving at the classroom, he sat down at a table near the front, knowing Sirius and James, no matter how 'smart' they assumed themselves to be, would never sit in the front row.
He took the time alone to scan the room. He saw Lily and Snape seated at the table next to them. They had another class with Slytherin. At least they had Astronomy with Hufflepuff and Charms with Ravenclaw. Seeing how James and Sirius acted around a certain Slytherin made Remus wish they had fewer classes with his green-clad classmates.
All of a sudden, Remus yawned. He was exhausted, and felt very weak. Up all night as a beast would take its toll on anybody. He didn't remember anything from the night before, but he did wake up in a pile of shredded furniture. At least it was the furniture and not a person.
"Are you sure you're alright?" he heard Peter ask. Remus tore himself out of his thoughts to look up at his fellow classmate.
"I'm fine," Remus said. "Just a little tired. I didn't get much sleep last night." Peter nodded and sat down next to Remus. Remus turned to see Sirius and James sitting behind them.
"You sure you don't want to join us?" Sirius said. Remus frowned.
"I'd rather not," Remus replied, turning back around. Soon the professor came in, looking almost as miserable as Remus felt. Remus could understand her pain.
"Hello class," the professor said. "My name is Professor Higgins and I am your Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher. I'll start out with the roll." She took a piece of parchment from her desk and began reading the names off the list. When she got to Remus's name, however, she paused.
"Mr. Lupin," she said, frowning. "I did not think you were going to make it to class today. Professor Dumbledore-"
"Said I could go to class if I felt up to it," Remus finished, hoping she wasn't going to reveal his secret on the second day. Dumbledore told him all the teachers had been informed of his condition. But this teacher was new, perhaps she didn't know it was supposed to be a secret.
"And I feel up to it."
"If you say so," Professor Higgins said, frowning more. Remus squirmed under her gaze. At first he thought she was angry at him for not resting after the full moon, like he was supposed to. But something didn't feel right about her gaze. It didn't feel like reprimanding, it felt more like-
"Professor," someone said, interrupting his thoughts. Remus turned to see the boy Severus Snape talking. Apparently, Professor Higgins had finished reading the roll while Remus was lost in his thoughts.
"Yes Mr. Snape." Professor Higgins said.
"Will we be learning about dark spells," he asked, "like hexes and curses?"
"Yes we will be learning about them," Professor Higgins said, causing many of the Slytherins to sit up in their chairs. Remus could hear James grumbling behind him. "But not learning how to cast them, but how to defend ourselves against them." The Slytherin students slumped back in their seats and Remus watched Snape's face go from curious to disappointed. Why, he thought, would any student want to learn dark spells?
"I'd like to hex the greasy hair off his stupid head," Remus heard Sirius whisper. Though Remus stood by what he said earlier, he couldn't help but agree with what Sirius said. Something was off about an eleven year-old who couldn't wait to learn hexes.
"I agree but let's stay away from the hexes right now," Remus heard James whisper back. "Don't want to start too big."
"I couldn't agree with you more," Sirius whispered. "The scissors will be good for now." Remus was happy he wouldn't need to worry too much about this prank at the moment. Sirius and James wouldn't be able to pull of this prank till at least third year.
"We'll start by talking about how defending yourself against dark arts can-"
"I think I saw the 'following spell' in my charms textbook," Sirius whispered, breaking Remus's concentration. He had been trying to concentrate on Professor Higgins lesson but the two nitwits behind him wouldn't shut up.
"I have my Transfiguration textbook with me," James whispered. "Do you have your charms textbook?"
"Yeah," Sirius whispered.
"You look for the spell, while I transfigure this quill into some scissors," James whispered. Remus frowned. They were going to attempt the prank here, in the middle of a lecture?
"Right now?" Sirius whispered. "In the middle of a lecture?" At least someone had some common sense, Remus thought.
"Yeah," James whispered. "She's not paying attention to us. Besides, if we don't do it now, we'll have to wait even longer. Besides, when will we ever need to defend ourselves against the Dark Arts. I know I'm going to stay as far away from them as possible."
"Reasonable logic Mr. Potter," Sirius whispered. Remus couldn't believe what he was hearing. Why wouldn't they want to defend themselves against dark magic? Dark magic was everywhere. In fact, there was a dark creature sitting in front of them at that very moment. Of course, they didn't know that, but that was for the best anyway.
After that, the two were quiet. Remus could hear paper rustling, most likely Sirius flipping through his Charms textbook. Finally, Remus could focus on the lecture. It was a while before he heard them speak again.
"Hey, you did it," Sirius whispered. Remus fought the urge to turn around. Surely James had not transfigured that quill into scissors already? That was an impossible spell for a first year on the second day of school. Maybe the prank was going to happen today after all.
"My wand is made for Transfiguration," James whispered. "The blades aren't very sharp but that will make the prank better. How's the charm coming along?"
"I found the spell," Sirius whispered. "But I'm not sure if I'll be able to cast it correctly. It's more complicated than I thought."
"Come on," James whispered. "If I can use a complex transfiguration spell at my age, you can charm these scissors."
"Alright," Sirius whispered, sounding a bit more confident. Remus relaxed a bit more. There was no way they could charm the scissors to follow Snape around. It was impossible.
"Sequor Sequi Secutus Snape," Remus heard Sirius whisper after a few seconds of silence. All of a sudden, a black and silver blur passed by his eye. Remus turned to see a pair of scissors floating right behind Severus Snape's head.
"Wow," Peter said, not bothering to keep his voice down.
"I can't believe it," Remus said, quieter than Peter but not really a whisper. Professor Higgins heard both of them and turned to look at them.
"What is so interesting to the two of you that you can't seem to pay attention to my lecture?" she asked. Peter looked embarrassed at getting into trouble. Remus would have been too, under normal circumstances, but this was too weird for him to be acting normally.
"Uh," Remus said, turning back to Professor Higgins quickly, hoping she didn't see where he was looking. Unfortunately she did, and when she turned to look, she gasped.
"What in the world?" she said, causing the students to look too. Snape turned behind him to see the scissors floating very close to his head. His eyes widened as he pushed them away, only for them to come closer. He tried to move away, only for them to keep following. The other students laughed, save for Lily and Remus. Lily was scared the scissors were going to poke her friend's eye out. Remus still couldn't get over the fact two first years were the cause of it.
"Stop moving Mr. Snape," Professor Higgins said, aiming her wand at the floating object racing after the boy. Snape shook his head and kept running.
"Weren't they supposed to cut his hair?" Remus heard Peter ask. He heard Sirius laugh, though it sounded more like a bark.
"Oh man," Sirius said. "We totally forgot about that."
"Don't worry mate," James said. "We'll have plenty of time to do that later."
"Mr. Snape," Professor Higgins said, grabbing Snape as he ran past her. She pointed her wand at the scissors speeding towards them. "Reducto," she said, causing the scissors to disintegrate into a pile of ashes.
"There goes my quill," James said, not even bothering to whisper this time since the rest of the class was still laughing. Unfortunately for him, however, Professor Higgins was close enough to hear him.
"So this was your doing Mr. Potter," she said. Remus turned around and watched as James's smile disappeared as Professor Higgins stared right at him.
"How could it have been me?" James asked, feigning innocence. "I'm only a first year. How could I have possibly charmed the scissors to follow Snape like that?"
"I have absolutely no idea how you were able to do that spell," Professor Higgins said, picking Sirius's Charms textbook off the table. "But I think it has something to do with this. Forty points from Gryffindor and all four of you will be spending tonight in detention."
"Four of us?" Sirius asked, confused.
"I saw you conversing with Mr. Potter during class," Professor Higgins said. Sirius glared at James. "Mr. Pettigrew was constantly looking back, as if he knew what you two were doing." Peter slouched down in his chair. "Mr. Lupin, looked more shocked than amused by what happened which I can only believe to be him knowing you two were up to something yet not telling me sooner."
"But I didn't know they were capable of doing that," Remus said. "Those spells are above our skill set. I didn't think they would be able to do that till at least third year."
"Detention, here, 8pm," Professor Higgins said, ignoring Remus.
"Professor Higgins-" Remus began, but was interrupted by the students leaving. Class was over.
"Don't worry Remus," James said, putting his arm around him. "This will be a good bonding experience for all of us." Remus shrugged his arm off and packed up his books.
He ignored them for the rest of the day.
Microsoft Word does not like spells, or anything Harry Potter related. I don't know if I spelled the name wrong or if MW is just being picky.
So lets just ignore that Sirius did that bird spell in Chapter 5 Part 2 of this story. Lets just pretend he used the levitating spell to pull his pants down or something. Cause that makes this charm spell more impressive. Everywhere I look it says Sirius and James were really gifted students, plus they've been living wizard lives for, well, their entire lives. They know more stuff. It may sound weird for them to be able to do this but at the same time it seems accurate, at least to me. I'm trying to stay as cannon as possible, but since there is so much cannon, and not all of it is coming from the books themselves but wikipages and J.K. Rowling, its hard keeping track of everything. There's them finding out about Remus being a werewolf, and them learning to become animagi, and James saving Snape and having an epiphany or something, and Binns gives James a chocolate card (which he apparently collects them and its in a game so I'm not sure if that should be cannon), and Lily and James start dating...you get the picture.
Yeah, that comment on defense against dark arts from James...yeah, sorry. Had to add it in. Not like the stuff he learned would have helped him anyway. There was no way to block the killing curse, and he didn't have his wand on him anyway...so yeah.
Comment on what you think. See you next week.
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