Remus bursts back into the common room with a box of acromantula antidote, vials clinking loudly against each other. Soon after is Sirius, who split off to grab a now ruffled McGonagall.
"-Ravenclaw door now asks 'who is the hottest man in Hogwarts?'," James cackles. "And it asks individuals -everyone individually needs to say it- and there were people sleeping in the corridors because they didn't want to answer 'sex god Dumbledore'!"
There are shrieks of laughter, even weak wheezing ones from students currently poisoned, all of them laid out on makeshift pallets on the ground with the furniture pushed back.
Lily summons a vial straight from the box and tips the first year girl's head up so she can drink but she's giggling and can't drink properly. Lily darts a look at James and tries for a berating glance but she's smiling.
McGonagall breathes a sigh of relief that everyone is being taken care of. "Alright students, all the dorms were attacked, we're now moving everyone injured to the hospital wing."
"Is there even enough room for this many people in the hospital wing, times four with all the other houses?" Harry demands, standing at the entrance to the stairs with his arms crossed and wand still in hand like a guardian deity. People have been going to him for questions and advice or to tell him any ideas they have like he's taken charge of the whole of Gryffindor (not far off).
McGonagall pauses. "Seeing as you've already brought up antidotes, only the severely affected will be escorted down. Seventh years, follow me up to seal the-"
"Rooms are sealed already," Harry cuts in. "Are the other common rooms safe? Do they have professors with them?"
Everyone is watching the back and forth with wide eyes.
"The other professors should have reached the common rooms by now," McGonagall replies, straightening.
"Are there no spiders in the main part of the castle?"
"That has not been confirmed yet."
"Is there enough antidote?"
"We're getting extra delivered from St Mungo's and Professor Slughorn is brewing more."
Harry turns to the rest of the room. "Sirius, get the map. The group who followed me upstairs, move to the left, any good potions students to the right, healers raise your hands again."
Sirius comes back downstairs to everyone organising themselves and shares a look with James and Remus. They can only shrug. There's no point keeping it secret - what better use is the map, right?
The three move together, unfolding the parchment, far more than it should be able to, until they have every floor on the one page, levitating it up against the wall because of how big it is.
Harry bowls right over any half-worded questions about it. "Six pest control and all the potions students, you'll be heading down to-" a quick check of the map "-Slughorn's private lab, get him to set you up in the classrooms to help make more antidote. Pest control, seal the whole room, cracks in the walls are big enough to let the spiders in, and stay with the potion students until they're done."
Harry does a quick count. "Healers grab a vial each, find two pest control and line up in front of me, I'll assign you people to find that are still scattered in the castle – if they're fine, keep them with you anyway until you pass a common room, it doesn't matter which, just shove them in. Do not split up. If they complain, you stun them."
Some students look at McGonagall and she nods. "I'm giving permission to use stunners, if after you have explained the situation, there is no genuine reason they can't follow you."
Harry leans towards the three Marauders. "Can you three stay here and send patronus messages to the groups to tell them where the next student is?" Harry gestures at the map.
There're not many students alone, most of them grouped up hiding in rooms so theoretically it shouldn't take that long.
Remus nods, Sirius salutes, and James is starry eyed at how fucking badass his baby boy is.
"I'll be heading to the hospital wing with the really injured people but I'll come back after," Harry explains. "Remus, don't let them do anything stupid."
"I'm positively delighted with your confidence in me," Sirius deadpans but it's true, he'd rather be outside helping instead of sitting here doing administration work. Damn, can he teach a first year to do the patronus spell fast enough to ditch this job?
James bounces up to Harry and grabs his hands. "Daddy is so proud of you," he gushes.
Everyone in hearing distance gives them a look and then shrugs it off. James has called Sirius weirder names.
Harry blushes and looks away. He clears his throat, pauses, leans in for a hug and then quickly pulls away. "Let's go, people! You're Gryffindors, time to prove it!"
What ends up happening is a lot more chaotic than expected because one or two groups got attacked by spiders in the halls (James obsessively tracks Lily's group whenever he has a spare moment after that because Harry will be so upset if his mum gets hurt), and there was a couple passed out in a cleaning closet with near-fatal bite marks that got shoved straight into St Mungo's.
Strangely enough it was Ravenclaw that struggled the most with the spiders in their common room because the panic won out, and they just didn't have the ruthlessness of Slytherin or the teamwork of Hufflepuff.
It was a madhouse just with the Marauders trying to keep track of all the teams so a couple other Gryffindors got scouted to help. Sirius does, in fact, teach a random first year to do patronus mist strong enough to also send messages but they're so backed up on communication relays that he's stuck in front of the map anyway.
It's hours later that they're certain everyone is accounted for and the common rooms are sealed. The house elves send up food (because they had no trouble, not when they regularly spend time cleaning random nooks and crannies of a giant castle, they've all seen some shit).
Most of the teams have returned and the potions students have swapped out with Slytherins to keep brewing.
Harry didn't come back like he said, he stayed in the hospital wing and had adult talk with the professors and incoming healers so the Marauders head down, James toting a big plate of food with him and the four of them end up collapsing shoulder to shoulder against the wall opposite the hospital wing doors, able to see inside to the now-organised chaos of way too many beds and St Mungo's backup healers.
Hagrid is nearly inconsolable, blubbering loudly to the other professors that he's not sure why the acromantula are behaving like this – he'll go talk to Aragog.
"Oof, awkward," Sirius mutters. "That bitch dead, homie."
"What?" Harry says in shock, looking up from his sandwich.
"You saw it, it's Remi's trophy," Sirius explains.
Harry is confused for a long moment. "Th-the spider you put in his bed? No, that was way too small to be Aragog - even years before I met him."
"We'd already shrunk it by then," James chimes in. "To get it up the stairs."
"You killed Aragog," Harry realises. "That's why the acromantula are attacking, they want -what- revenge?"
"Only the little ones apparently," James muses.
"Only the-" Harry's eyes go wide. "They were a scouting party."
Sirius shares a look with James and Remus. "Harry, I really think you're overestimating the spiders-"
Harry is already up and inside the hospital wing, explaining to the professors gathered around the half giant, gesturing with his half-eaten sandwich.
Remus says nothing for a long moment. "Did I…did I do this? By killing Aragog?"
"If anything, I started it," James muses, doesn't sound particularly upset.
Sirius scoffs. "Please, we fuck around a bit and the answer is to attack the whole castle? No, this beyond us, Remus."
Remus hesitates.
James flops over, bumping into Remus' shoulder. "You don't remember but we went over, and I complimented Aragog nicely-"
Sirius rolls his eyes.
"-I did! It was nice," James protests.
"And then they attacked," Sirius finishes, leaning over the space Harry left and catching Remus' eyes. "We weren't aggressive, we didn't mention a fight, Moony was too busy going after James instead. In fact, we were already running off when they started chasing us."
James shrugs, jostling Remus. "It wasn't you. It wasn't us. They came after us because they eat humans -and whatever, I don't take that personally- but now they're being sore losers 'cause they got their shit rocked by the cutest werewolf in the northern hemisphere."
Remus purses his lips but smiles anyway. He doesn't quite believe Moony isn't at least the starting domino but it has gone past them, especially if this is retaliation for a fight the acromantula started. Maybe Remus' morals are just a bit skewed hanging around James and Sirius.
"I don't think they believe him," James muses as the professors pat Harry on the shoulder and clearly try to calm him down.
Sirius frowns. "How dare they not take my godson's word as law."
Remus sighs but stands up when James and Sirius do. "The things I do for this family."
James and Sirius kick up such a fuss that the entire school spends the night in the Great Hall in sleeping bags, with prefects like Remus patrolling with teachers in shifts while they wait for Dumbledore's creature specialist contacts to arrive.
In the meantime, Harry goes down to the Chamber of Secrets to convince the basilisk to patrol the pipes because if spiders are afraid and run from the basilisk then it would be strange not to ask as a second line of defence.
When Harry gets back and snuggles into his sleeping bag with James and Sirius already tangled together by his side, Harry muses that it's a bit of a weird mirror to his second year except Harry is the one with all the information and in control.
It feels pretty fucking good to not be the one scrambling to keep his head above water, to have people actually listen to him.
.
A/N: And that concludes this episode of badass Harry getting shit done.