"Good morning class, I hope you all had a good summer!"
The classroom was dead silent, with some people looking at Vegito as if he was insane for asking such a thing in these times. This was his first class, fifth year Gryffindors and Ravenclaws, and it was full to capacity.
The problem was, Vegito had no idea what the hell he was going to teach them.
"So…" he trailed off. Everyone was looking at him expectantly. Vegito wracked his brain, a brain that had decades of combined experience in life-threatening combat situations but had a grand total of zero schooling.
He shrugged and decided to just wing it.
"Can you guys keep a secret?" He asked in a very non-scholarly tone. The students looked at each other, not sure where the professor was going with this, but a few hesitantly nodded.
"Well, I don't really know shit about the history of anything, much less magic."
This elicited gasps from a few of the Ravenclaws in the room. All the students were giving him varied looks of disbelief.
"It's the truth." Vegito admitted at seeing their reactions, "I tried reading this book here-" he pulled out a copy of Hogwarts: A History, "But to be honest with you guys, I've never been the reading type. And especially not something as boring as this piece of crap."
A round of laughter swept through the classroom; Vegito didn't know why they were laughing, but seeing as they weren't laughing at him he took it as a positive sign.
"I'm serious, I mean, what do you kids think about this stuff?" he asked.
"What stuff?" someone asked.
"Yanno, Goblin rebellions for example, from what I skimmed there's a billion of them."
"Those bloody goblins are just a bunch of greedy bastards! They always want to take more!" one Gryffindor boy yelled, earning cheers from most of the classroom.
"Oh come off it," A Ravenclaw girl responded, "Goblins were being oppressed by wizards for centuries, they were only fighting for their rights."
"WHAT DID YOU SAY?"
"BLOODY GOBLIN LOVER! WHY DON'T YOU GO OUT AND MARRY ONE?"
"EVERYONE CALM DOWN!" Vegito's voice boomed over all of the students cursing the Ravenclaw girl out, "I'm sure we can argue this thing out like magic beings, can't we?" the room fell silent at the teachers' admonishment, "Now, you two," he pointed out the Gryffindor boy and the flustered Ravenclaw girl, "You'll each have a turn to argue your points, ok?"
"Yes professor." they responded in unison.
Vegito clapped his hands together, "Ok then, get to arguing!"
… 56 minutes later…
"That's ridiculous, Herpo the foul wouldn't last a second against Salazar Slytherin!"
"Just because Slytherin was a founder doesn't mean he was all powerful!"
"Still, he lived 300 years after Herpo, magic had advanced enough in that time to give Slytherin an advantage!"
"That doesn't matter! Slytherin was only an average dueler for his time, his real expertise was in potions and warding. Herpo would have wiped the floor with him!"
Vegito's watch vibrated, letting him know that class was about to end. He had to say, the past hour had been enlightening. He'd learned a lot about wizarding history with all the arguing the kids had done; they'd jumped from tangent to tangent and ended up somewhere completely unrelated to the original discussion. The students seemed to love it too, either they were knowledgable about a topic and they wanted to put their two cents in to prove they were smarter than everyone else, or they just watched with interested as two of their classmates tried to beat each other down with words and facts.
"Ok, that's enough for today kids." he interrupted as one redhead Gryffindor kid was challenging Herpo's victory over Bardus the Grand as irrelevant due to Bardus' weakened state at the time.
"Awwwww!" the class groaned
"Can't we finish this argument?" one boy asked.
"Sorry kids." everyone looked downtrodden, "Tell you what, you all do some more research on these two and make sure you really know your stuff, and next class we'll keep it going."
Cheers rang up throughout the classroom.
Outside, many people were walking by the History classroom perplexed, having never heard anything but dead silence come from this room. Minerva McGonagall had heard the commotion fifteen minutes ago and was waiting outside. She tapped her foot impatiently as she expected to overhear the students discuss how professor Vegito was a bumbling fool that had made a mockery of Hogwarts' teaching standards. Albus would have to withstand her wrath at lunch.
As the students filed out, they were talking excitedly amongst themselves.
"He's brilliant. Pretending to not know anything so that we can discuss history ourselves? Genius!"
"I'm going to hit the library as soon as I can, don't want anybody else to hog all the good books."
Minerva was frozen in place. Some of professor Vegito's first years shuffled in as she stood rooted to the spot. For the first time in her years of teaching, Minerva would be late for her next class.
...
Before the opening feast, the seventh year Divination class was small enough that it was composed of students from all houses. For some reason, there was a sudden influx of interest in the course. Now there was enough space for two classes.
In about five minutes, the Gryffindor and Hufflepuff students would arrive. Baba was sitting at her desk, having stacked a bunch of books on her chair so her crystal ball was visible on top of her desk. Trunks was leaning against the wall next to the classroom's trapdoor entrance.
Trunks didn't know what role he was going to play in this farce of a class, and he was frustrated.
"Baba, why don't you just find out where these people hold their valuables and send us around to steal them? It would be more worthwhile than me wasting my time in here."
Baba shook her head, "Oh Trunks, you don't understand. It's not just the loot. The act of conning people out of their livelihood is its own reward." Trunks actually looked contemplative at these words, which seemed very wise to him.
"You know what, I'm going to observe your methods. There might be something I can glean from you."
"Of course you can glean something from my genius! Why do you think the demand for this class grew so quickly when they found out I was teaching it?" Trunks rolled his eyes, he knew the real reason: horny schoolgirls, and they were most definitely not directing their gaze at Baba.
The clock that was mounted on the wall buzzed, signifying that class period would begin in five minutes.
Trunks waved his hand and the trapdoor slammed open. He walked over to a stool next to a table in the back corner and sat down, waiting for the students to arrive. Baba pulled out some blank rolls of parchment and began shuffling them. Soon there was a murmur of voices and the sound of moving feet. The students began filing into the room, the mass of bodies spreading out onto the tables.
Lily was among the first to arrive, so she was quick to take the table next to Trunks, along with a few other girls. The Marauders took the next table over, keeping a close eye to make sure the obviously lecherous assistant didn't take advantage of any of the girls (especially Lily).
Baba waited for everyone to settle in before clearing her throat. "Welcome students, to the most important class in your magical education!" Lily couldn't help herself from snorting loudly at this.
"Is she really this full of herself?" She whispered to her tablemates.
Trunks had overheard her, "Believe me, it gets worse." Lily held down a blush at the handsome purple haired teen.
"But, you're her assistant, shouldn't you be supportive of her?"
He waved her off "Bah, she's an old hag."
"AS I WAS SAYING CLASS!" Baba raised her voice to catch her assistant's attention. "This is Trunks my docile and subservient assistant. Anyways, I want all of you to begin rubbing your crystal balls in a nice circular motion."
The entire classroom looked hesitant before they began doing as the witch said. It was uncomfortable, the dry surface of the crystal ball creating a painfully annoying squeak as their palms made contact with it.
"Rub some of that lotion I've put in your tables in there too."
Lily looked around her table and saw a bottle of some sort of lotion had just appeared. All four girls squeezed out some of the lotion and began rubbing it all over the ball, their hands now gliding smoothly over it.
James and Sirius were having fun, rubbing the ball in suggestive ways. Peter thought it would be funny to rub the ball with two fingers as if it had nipples, but he thought better of it, remembering his friend's reactions to previous jokes.
"Hey prongs, look at this!" Sirius began rubbing the crystal ball with his index and middle finger as if it had a pair of nipples. "Hahaha, don't do it too hard Padfoot! don't want to overstimulate them eh?"
Peter grinded his teeth in frustration. "You there, rat looking boy! Why aren't you rubbing lotion?" Baba pointed him out "50 points from whatever house you're from!"
Sirius smacked peter in the back of the head "Goddamnit Wormtail, have a talk with yourself!"
"That's enough rubbing, class." Baba raised her hands up and the class gasped as the balls floated up in the air. They couldn't believe a small old lady could do something not even You-Know-Who was capable of. Baba called the crystal balls to her and opened up a trunk under her desk. The balls flew over the desk and down into the bottomless trunk. Baba nodded appreciatively, "Good, I needed to have those cleaned up a long time ago." she cracked her knuckles and looked around the room, "Well, let's get started then." she looked over at a Hufflepuff girl "You there, what's your name?"
"Katie Zang, professor."
"I want you to think of a number between one and ten."
"O…K." the girl responded, not sure where this was going.
Baba then directed her attention to the blonde sitting next to her, "You, guess what number she's thinking of."
The blonde girl paused a second, wondering if the teacher was actually being serious. Finally she answered, "Um… three?" she looked over at Katie to see if she was right, but Katie shook her head. "It was nine."
"Don't tell her the number, stupid girl!" Baba snapped, "You kids will never learn to see the future if you can't even see the present! I want all of you to pair up and try out this exercise for the rest of the class." heh, and she was scared that she wouldn't find a way to fill 90 minutes.
Almost every single student smiled simultaneously. If they were going to earn credit hours for doing this then divination was going to be awesome. There was a mass of chattering as students partnered up. Lily ended up without a partner when her best friend Alice stood up and dashed over to Frank. She looked around and saw there was nobody she could do the 'exercise' with. Not like she really wanted to waste her time doing something so intellectually insulting anyways.
Baba noticed the red head wasn't paired up, so she waved at Trunks, "Assistant, do the exercise with that friendless girl." she said loudly, making Lily redden indignantly. Trunks shrugged and stood up. Lily dipped her head as everyone was looking at her, all of the girls glaring with hatred and Potter looking shaken to his core. Trunks sat down next to her.
"Hey there again," he smiled.
"Hi," she said meekly, moving a strand of hair behind her ear. She hated that she was acting as vapid as all the other girls, but he had such nice eyes!
The next table down, Remus was trying to calm a seething James down, "Cool it Prongs, he's just doing his job."
James grit his teeth, "We are so pranking the shit out of that guy."
"Five." Sirius guessed. Peter shook his head "It's not five."
Sirius narrowed his eyes suspiciously. "Why the hell would you do that?"
"Do what?" Peter cowered.
"You were clearly thinking of five and then changed it when I guessed right!"
"WHAT?! Of course I didn't, how would you even know that?"
"Because I have the gift of divination you dumbass." Sirius said, as if this was obvious.
"Not cool Wormtail, not cool." James and Remus scolded him. Peter struck his palms to his sweaty face, why was he even friends with these guys?
Meanwhile, Trunks and Lily were getting started with their exercise.
"Ok, guess what number I'm thinking of." He put a finger to his temple as if he was concentrating heavily, which made Lily giggle.
"Ten?"
Trunks shook his head.
"Four?"
"Nope"
"Six?"
Trunks finally nodded. The two sat in silence for a second before they both burst into laughter.
"This is so dumb." Trunks said.
"I take it you don't think highly of your boss?" Lily asked, happy that he wasn't a divination weirdo.
"Nah. To be honest with you, I'm doing this to help get back at someone." He admitted.
"Really? What did they do?" She whispered, not wanting the professor to overhear.
Trunks inched close to her, something a watching James did not approve of at all, "The most I can say is that my boss at my real job has it coming."
Lily raised an eyebrow, not really understanding how being an annoying old witch's assistant helped him get revenge on his boss. "How old are you anyways?" she blurted it out and felt ashamed the moment she asked it, knowing she was entering flirting territory now.
"I'm pretty much the same age as you guys, I just turned 18 a few months ago." he offered her a charming smile that made her want to melt. Merlin, she could tell he was a bad boy but she couldn't help herself, it was like he was what Potter tried so hard to be.
"By the way, what's your name?" he asked, "You know, so I can jot down on the student list that you did the assignment." the side of his mouth curved upward as he said this last part. Lily covered her mouth to muffle another giggle. "Lily Evans, I'm the head girl."
Trunks wracked his brain for what the hell a head girl was, then he remembered a boarding school his mom almost forced him to attend when he was 12 (he'd sneaked into her lab and created a black hole that almost consumed the whole solar system. He blamed it all on Goten, but Bulma had already smartened up by then). He remembered that the heads and prefects were basically full time hall monitors. That meant that Lily was both a very smart girl and a goody-two shoes, just the kind of girl that would fall for him.
"Well in that case, I look forward to doing rounds with you."
"ALL RIGHT! THAT'S IT!" James' voice snapped the entire class out of what they were doing. James was standing over Trunks, seething with rage.
Lily wanted to crawl into a hole from embarrassment, "Potter, would you please stop making a fool of yourself?" she told him through gritted teeth, her face red as a tomato as the whole classroom was staring at them.
"No way Lilyflower, I have to defend your honor from this lecherous... lecher!" he squared up on Trunks, who looked more amused than intimated.
Baba was watching all this with interest, but she realized she needed to take control of the class, "Listen now Mr-" she looked around to see where the class list was, but she'd left it somewhere "- Boy with glasses! You will return to your table or I will give you detention forever!"
James wasn't listening, and with a determined look on his face, he stared right at Trunks "Sir, I challenge you to a duel!" there was a gasp throughout the entire room. Baba's eyes lit up, she was going to see where this went.
"A duel eh, and what would the prize be?" Trunks asked in amusement.
"The winner takes Lily's hand in marriage!" James said dramatically, eliciting another, equally dramatic gasp from the students.
Lily stood up in rage, ready to curse James to hell or highwater, "Potter, are you insane? I will not be put up as a reward for your childish antics!"
James put his hands up defensively, sensing that Lily might be about to hex him, "Don't worry Lilyflower, I won't let him win."
Lily grabbed James by the scruff of his neck and pulled him to her roughly. It was a position that James would have enjoyed if Lily wasn't gripping him like a Hippogriff and glaring at him with so much intense hatred, "You. Will. Not. Do. It. Understood?"
"Ok." James said weakly. Lily pushed him away and sat back down in her chair, not giving anymore fucks about how much the class was gaping at her.
"Well, that was fun." Trunks quipped. James turned right back to him, anger returning to his expression, "We're not calling this off. The loser will be stripped of their magic-"James' eyes bulged when he realized what he'd just said "- for a month" he added hastily.
Trunks pretended to mull it over. Lily put a hand on his shoulder, "Trunks, you don't have to do this." she looked at him pleadingly.
Trunks offered her a reassuring smile that he knew she'd just love, "Don't worry Lily, I'll be fine." he stood up to face James. They were both the same height, but while James was very slim Trunks cut an imposing figure with his muscular build. "I accept your challenge."
"Good! the duel will be at lunch in the Great Hall, be there!" James offered him one final glare and then stormed out of the classroom. The other three marauders quickly followed.
The class was in stunned silence, there hadn't been a formal duel in Hogwarts in forever, some kids didn't even know it was possible.
"All right then students." Baba looked around her classroom. She was sporting a huge grin as she pulled out a board with hundreds of tickets, "Place your bets! Place your bets! I have six to one odds on Trunks, minimum wager is three sickles, who's in?"
All the students immediately ran over to Baba, wanting to put money on this momentous event. Baba really, really wanted to burst into evil laughter, but she'd need to save it for later. Bringing Trunks and Vegito along was turned out to be a great idea.
…..
"DUEL! DUEL! DUEL! DUEL!"
The entire great hall was chanting. News of the duel between the Head Boy and the divinations assistant had spread like wildfire. The entire student body was forming a circle around the two teenagers, who were preparing for the duel. Vegito was at the staff table with Hagrid, sharing some firewhisky that the giant had snuck in and gazing upon the chaos with glee. Baba could be seen weaving in and out of the sea of students, collecting money. It seemed that everyone had put money on Trunks.
"What is going on here?" Dumbledore, followed by the rest of the staff, entered the great hall.
"It's a duel, professor!" Somebody yelled out.
Mcgonagall scoffed, "There will be no such thing, there hasn't been a duel at Hogwarts in over fifty years."
"I know for a fact that a duel in Hogwarts cannot happen unless it's sanctioned by a teacher." Flitwick said.
The entire student body groaned in disappointment as they saw their entertainment disintegrate.
Dumbledore smiled, "Well, do any of you sanction this duel?" he looked back at his staff, who all shook their heads, "In that case, I can safely say-"
"I sanction this duel!" Baba cut him off. The students roared in cheers as the tiny woman came into view. She was sitting on her crystal ball and had a gigantic sack filled with galleons following behind her.
"Headmaster, you can't allow her to do this!" Sprout pleaded Dumbledore.
Albus had no choice, rules were rules and there was nothing he could do about it, no matter how much he wanted to wring the little hag's neck. "One of them dies, and it's on your head." he told Baba simply. The entire hall burst into another cheer as people returned to chanting for the fight. Dumbledore strolled over to his spot on the high table. The teachers looked outraged that he'd allowed this. but Flitwick and Slughorn snuck into the circle of students to get a good look at the fighting.
"Ah, professor Slughorn, good to see you here." Baba commended the corpulent man, "Care to place a bet?"
Slughorn looked down at the tickets Baba was holding, she was almost sold out, "Don't mind if I do!" he pulled out his money pouch and started counting Galleons.
In the middle of it all, Trunks and James stood at opposite sides. James was twirling his wand and Trunks was holding the stick Baba had conjured up for him.
"You ready to lose, pretty boy?" James taunted.
Trunks rolled his eyes, "Just get on with it."
James steeled himself and leapt into action, using every dueling technique his father had taught him.
"Confrigo. Bombardra. Stupefy. Impedimenta!" He yelled out as many incantations as he could in quick succession, bombarding Trunks with spellfire. Trunks calmly sidestepped each spell. James continued firing curse after curse, trying to shoot them off in all directions, but somehow Trunks was able to dodge each and every one of them.
"Aren't you going to attack, you coward?" James yelled out, already getting out of breath.
Trunks took that as his cue to do something, so he held his stick as expertly as he could and yelled out a spell "Makemeus Fasticus!" he made a show of waving the stick over himself. His 'spell' complete, Trunks fazed right in front of the black haired teen. James' eyes widened in shock and he tried to jump back, but Trunks swiped his wand from his hand before he could do anything about it.
Trunks twirled James' wand in his fingers "I hope you learned to never challenge a stranger to a duel."
James was trying to stand as firm as he could, though he was trembling slightly waiting for Trunks to finish him off. What Trunks did next shocked everybody. He tossed James' wand at him and the head boy caught it with trepidation.
"You learned your lesson, now hit me."
"WHAT?!"
"THAT's CHEATING!"
"They were in on it the whole time!"
The entire student body groaned in disappointment and anger at what was happening. Seeing that it might become a volatile situation, Baba yelled out "NO REFUNDS!" and ran off with her money while everyone was still focused on the duel.
"You're letting me win?" James asked incredulous.
"I can't exactly allow a student to go a month without magic now, can I?" Trunks smirked when he saw all the women swoon at his 'nobility'. He really wanted to pat himself on the back.
With slight hesitation, James shot a stunning spell at Trunks. Trunks took it and was shocked when the spell sent him crashing to the ground. He hadn't actually expected magic to do anything to him, but it seemed magic didn't follow the same logic as ki. He wasn't knocked unconscious, but he was definitely thrown for a loop and disoriented.
"I won." James said dully. There were boos heard throughout the hall, though a lot of people had to admit that assistant professor Trunks was certainly a really swell guy. To give up his magic for a month so that a student wouldn't go without? Even though the student had instigated everything? How noble and kind he was.
The students began to disperse, some heading for their tables and others leaving the Great Hall. Many were distraught when they realized they'd gambled away all their Hogsmeade money and now had nothing to shop with. Others had bet a little bit more and were wringing their hands nervously at the thought of what would happened when their parents checked their Gringotts account. Nobody had put money on James.
"I hope you're happy Potter!" an angry and worried Lily stepped up. She knelt down to help Trunks stand up, "are you ok?" she asked with worry in her voice.
"I've been worse." Trunks groaned as she helped him up. He was still a bit surprised, not having expected magic to work on him. Thank Dende he didn't brick wall some of those spells like he'd thought about, or he might have looked like a chump.
James stepped forward hesitantly "Lily I didn't-"
"No Potter, you've done enough, now leave me alone!" Lily put Trunks' arm over her shoulder to support him. Trunks could walk fine, but he wasn't complaining about being pressed up against the red head. "Lily, take me to my quarters please." Lily nodded and they walked off slowly, Trunks exaggerating his limp as much as he could. James was left alone, staring at their retreating backs with a contemplative look.
The marauders walked up to him, having witnessed the whole thing and knowing that he needed a pick me up.
"Its ok, Prongs." Sirius clasped a hand on his best mate's back, "In fact, why don't we find out where his room is with the map and fill it with dung bombs? You guys with me right?" he glanced back at Remus and Peter, who gave their support.
"No guys, no pranking." James said soberly "I-I think I learned something today. I've been chasing after a girl that doesn't like me, that I never got to know as a friend and that might not have anything in common with me, and its lead me to make a whole bunch of stupid decision. I think I'm done chasing Lily guys."
Sirius and Peter were shocked, Remus had tears in his eyes, "James, I never thought you'd make such a mature and sensible decision."
James took a deep breath, "Yeah well, its time I moved on. Besides, there's always that red head in Ravenclaw with the huge knockers."
Remus deflated a bit. Well, it was a start.
"You mean Amelia Bones?" Sirius asked.
"Yep" James nodded, already fantasizing about motorboating those beauties.
Sirius hesitated a little before speaking, "Sheesh Prongs, if I had known…"
"What do you mean Padfoot?"
"I already shagged her."
James' mood fell a bit "Well, I guess there's always that 6th year…"
"Shagged her." Sirius cut him off.
James became agitated, "I didn't even say what house she was in!"
"Is she in 6th year?"
"Yes."
"Is she attractive?"
"Yes."
"Then I've shagged her."
James grumbled, glaring at his best friend "Remus, Peter, take five. Padfoot and I need to figure out what decent looking bird he hasn't shagged." he dragged Sirius off, trying to find one attractive female in Hogwarts that Padfoot hadn't buried his bone in.