This is based off that one tumblr post….
Scorpius was walking back to the dorm after dinner when Angus Brown stopped him.
"You know the new password right?" he asked in undertones.
Scorpius said he didn't—the password had been "cunning" for the last 6 months.
"It's 'Mud-bloods go home.'" He then started to walked away, calm as ever.
"Wait a second, what?!" Scorpius cried. "That's the password?! You've got to be joking!"
"Hey, I don't like it either," Brown said in that seemingly permanent undertone. "But it's not like this is the first time. Mom says that before the battle of Hogwarts, it used to be stuff like that all the time. It's calmed down since then, but I guess something must have made it angry."
"Wonderful," Scorpius grunted, before running in the opposite direction all the way up to the Hufflepuff entrance.
He'd seen Rose do this before. She tapped some barrels, right? He tried his best to recreate the tapping, only to have vinegar fall out of a barrel he hadn't seen on the ceiling and douse him. He shrieked in surprise.
Someone on the inside must have heard him shriek, because Eva Sinclair opened the door cautiously.
Her eyes landed on Scorpius and she tried to stifle her giggle. "Can I help you?"
"Is Rose there?"
"Yeah..." She paused, as if considering her answer. "I'll get her."
When Rose opened the door, she laughed. Long and hard. She was on the floor in tears when it finally occurred to her to ask what he needed.
"Can I just hang out in your common room for a while?"
"Um, sure, I don't see why not. Why do you need to?" Rose let Scorpius help her off the ground.
"Slytherin common room is not an option right now and I need a place to think." Despite everything on his mind, Scorpius still couldn't help marveling at the beauty of the room—the plants, the light, the soft couches—the precise opposite of the Slytherin common room. Scorpius sat on a part of the floor without a rug, trying not to get the vinegar everywhere. Rose sat down beside him.
"Scorpius," she placed her hand on his knee and stared straight into his eyes, not to have her question evaded. "What happened?"
He sighed in resignation. He knew he would have to tell her, but it felt shameful, even if they weren't his own words.
"The Slytherin password. It's-" he took a dramatic breath."'Muggle-borns go home'. Except the word isn't Muggle-borns."
"Merlin, and that's the password?!"
"I won't say it. So I need to find a way around it and I just don't want to run into any Slytherins right now."
"Of course. Stay here as long as you need." She paused for a second. "Question. Do you think any of the other Slytherins are opposed to it?"
Scorpius thought about his fellow Slytherins. Were they pompous? Of course. Jerks? For the most part. But bigoted? Not the majority of them.
"Probably," he replied, a little hope tinging his voice.
"Well then there's only one thing to do. Stay here."
Rose went into a girl's dorm for a while as Scorpius awkwardly sat in the common room, trying to will his vinegar smell not to diffuse into the room and ruin the crisp, homey scent it usually had. When she emerged, she just gave him a thumbs up and walked straight over to the 7th year boy's dorm. This time she stood outside the door, so Scorpius could hear what she was saying.
"The Slytherin password is 'Mud-bloods go home'." She said without any greeting. "If any Slytherin needs a place to sleep for the night because they don't wish to make this statement, we should make our common room available. Agreed?" Scorpius heard murmurs of male assent until Patrick Macmillan spoke up.
"But we can't just leave Slytherins in our common room unattended. That's a recipe for ruin."
"Fine, they won't be unattended. Two of you can sleep in the common room with them and one of my girls and I will too."
More grunts of male assent.
"Great. Then it's settled. Tell the rest of the boys. Can I borrow a quill and parchment?"
Rose rushed out to a common room end table a few moments later, scribbled something on the parchment and flew out of the room, parchment in one hand, dragging Scorpius along with the other.
"You'll have to lead me to the Slytherin entrance," she said to Scorpius, almost running down the hall.
She didn't seem interested in conversation outside of "Hurry up!", and "Faster!" as Scorpius led her to the basement, so they power-walked together in missional silence.
When they reached the door, Rose held up the parchment to it a moment before exclaiming, "Tape! I forgot tape! How could I be so stupid?! How am I gonna put it up there?"
Scorpius looked at her with a smirk. As always. "Witch."
Rose looked at him a moment. "Oh!" She giggled. "Right." She performed the fixing charm.
"Professor Finnegan would be proud." said Scorpius, but he didn't know how much he meant it until he read the sign.
Any Slytherin who is unbigoted and refuses to say the current Slytherin password is welcome to stay in the Hufflepuff common room as long as necessary.
"Do you think they'll be able to find the Hufflepuff commons?" she asked nervously.
"I'll leave a Flagrate trail."
"You can do that? How long will it last?"
"You forget Charms is my specialty."
They smiled at each other like idiots.
"Right. Well let's go. It's creepy down here." They started back up, Scorpius leaving a flaming trail behind them.
"Does little Rose need me to hold her hand?"
"I'm fine."
"You're sure?"
"Yes."
"You're positive?"
"Completely."
"Well alright then. Just know, if you feel the need to faint, it's alright. I'm licensed in the art of catching frightened damsels."
"Are you also licensed in being a damsel, or do you keep that on the down low?"
"Down low."
"Wise thinking."
"Yeah the guys would not crown me King of Slytherin if they found out my favorite pass time was fainting dramatically."
"These guys...You think they'll refuse to say that?"
"I don't know how many would refuse, but I think almost all of them will want to avoid it if possible. I think the Hufflepuff commons will be pretty crammed tonight, if that's okay."
"It's perfectly fine. We just don't want anybody forced into saying something against their morals."
"Thank you."
Rose smiled sadly at him.
"No problem."
When they reached the door, Scorpius watched Rose do the tapping thing and shook his head in wonder. 'Just knock' he wrote by the door with his flames.
Inside, they found Eva Sinclair, Jonathan Abbot and Alfred Treaty waiting for them with sleeping bags and a can of Lysol for Scorpius.
"Let's get this party started!" laughed Jonathan, and everyone joined in.
One by one students knocked on the door until almost all of Slytherin was in the Hufflepuff common room. 1st and 2nd years took to sharing sleeping bags. Up to 3 kids were on each couch. Everyone was crammed to the point of physical contact, but nobody seemed to mind.
Rose had the sleeping bag next to Scorpius. "You still smell like vinegar."
"Sorry. I don't know what I was thinking earlier. I was kinda freaked."
Rose laughed. "It's alright. I kinda like the smell of vinegar. It makes me think of Easter. You know, dying eggs with vinegar."
"I've never done that."
"Well, you'll have to come to my house over Easter then."
"I'm sure your dad would love that."
Rose went silent for a moment. "He can deal," she concluded. Then she laughed. "After all, it will be Easter. It seems pretty wrong to murder someone on Easter."
"It seems pretty wrong to murder someone in general."
"Yeah... isn't it weird to think both our parents are murderers? We like to think of them as loving people who raised us, and they are, but they have this whole other side to them—a history, things they're not proud of."
Scorpius chuckled. "The words 'not proud' and my parents don't belong in the same sentence. I know they regret their decisions and allegiance during the war, and they never want me going down that sort of path, but in a weird way, they still have their pride. They like to look forward, I guess."
"Looking forward... so they wouldn't mind if you came to our house to learn about Easter eggs?"
"Probably not. In fact, they'd probably just be glad I have a friend."
"How come I never see you with anyone else?"
"I'm a lone wolf."
"But we're friends."
"You're different."
"How?"
"I don't know, you just are."
"Scorpius?"
"Yeah?"
"You're different too."
"Thanks."
It was dark and almost everyone was asleep by then, and while they were both sleepy, they stayed awake, just staring at each other for a bit.
Scorpius had just worked up his nerve and was about to make sure Rose knew how pretty her eyes were when McGonagall stormed in.
"What is the meaning of this?!"
Scorpius and Rose scrambled up on their feet and some assorted others groggily sat up.
"Professor McGonagall," said Scorpius, now wide awake. "The Slytherin password changed today. It's now "Muggle-borns go home" except not Muggle-borns, if you catch my meaning, Professor."
"What on Earth?! That is unacceptable. I will address the issue immediately. Get your peers up. They will be returning to Slytherin dorms tonight. You could have just alerted me, you know, but, 70 points to Hufflepuff and 1 point for each Slytherin in this common room. She started walking out.
"Oh, and Scorpius?"
"Yes, Professor?"
"What would you have the new password be?"
Scorpius looked at Rose, who was smiling proudly at him. He walked over to the professor, who bent over so that he could whisper it in her ear.
"Allies."
McGonagall smiled and walked out.