*****
James couldn't wait as his heart pounded loudly in his chest, more from adrenaline than fear as he and his friends made their way as silently as they could through the hallways, slowly making their way down to the dungeons. They had already avoided a potentially nasty predicament with Peeves and they had the invisibility cloak to thank for that.
"That way." Sirius whispered as he made a gesture to the right staircase at the end of the hall that would lead them into the deepest parts of the castle.
The four boys crouched under the invisibility cloak as they walked in unison towards the staircase trying to be quiet, but Peter kept tripping and stepping on the back of James' heals as they went along the hallway. He winced in pain and tried to keep his voice from expressing his pain and lashing out at the small boy. They didn't need to blow the prank because of a bit of accidental stepping on feet. They had waited a very long time for this moment.
And indeed that day, during school had proven to be very difficult to withstand. The clocks had been so slow they seemed to be moving backwards rather than forwards as they waited for their last class to end. Which it also probably didn't help that it was their slowest class anyway outside of adding a big thing to wait for on top of it but somehow, they had lived through it. They had gone to dinner without acting too suspicious, at least, that is, no one outside of their little group would have thought them to be up to anything. But once they had left dinner and returned to their common room they had secluded themselves in their room and went over every key detail they would need in order to get this prank completed perfectly.
After that they had had to wait another extended period of time before they were sure every other person was in their beds. When they were sure of that fact, that was when they whipped out the cloak James had inherited from his father, who he had gotten from his father�well you get the point. James honestly had no idea how old the cloak really was, just that it proved to be very useful during times like these.
"Here it is." Peter said.
They stood there staring at a large stonewall. Peter muttered the password just loud enough so the wall could hear it and instantly a hidden door opened up to a large long room with a low ceiling, at least compared to the Gryffindor common rooms'. They walked in and stared open mouthed at the elaborate fireplace and the green antique furniture that surrounded it. James nudged Sirius and Remus in their sides and motioned to a staircase in which he saw a Slytherin boy walk up seconds before. Sirius was too busy to notice the tap on his side, he was occupying himself by giving his cousin death glares, even though he knew the girl couldn't see him, which most likely made it all the more fun for him. Yet, he did move when James took the initiative and moved towards the staircase.
Sure enough the staircase did lead to the Dormitories. They looked up at the carvings in the stone above them, looking for the first years level. They found it, making good time and went to walk down the long stretch of stone that held gothic style sanctuary doors that lead to the bedchambers themselves. None of these doors were open, but they had expected that. The Slytherins had a general personality that needed solitude. No doubt it was probably torture for them to even have to share a dorm with someone else, even if it was a fellow housemate. But their need for the doors to their rooms to be closed posed as a bit of a problem.
"What do we do?" Remus whispered in James' ear.
Sirius answered his question by walking over to the nearest door (taking the other boys with him) and opened it. He looked in but when he only found a few unfamiliar faces he closed it once more.
Following his lead they each walked together under the cloak making their way down the hall opening every door. Each time they opened a new one they got a different reaction from the people inside. Some stared at their door just waiting for someone to come and jump out at them (Sirius assumed that they had taken Professor Malvitz�s speeches to heart), others screamed obscenities at them only to find that, apparently, no one was there, and the most interesting reaction was when little Travis Travers chucked his shoe at them and yelled for whoever it was to go away in a very scared high pitched voice, it appeared that their little interrogation had left the boy a little paranoid.
They only had to go down merely two more doors before they found Snape's room. The room was empty except for the furniture and an essay for Transfiguration that had Snape's name on the top. James, out of curiosity, picked it up and started to read it and chuckled to himself. Snape was going to fail this essay. He only put it down when Sirius poked him in his side with his index finger and pointed to a small stuffed bear, that looked like it needed to be retired it was so old, sitting on Snape's pillow. The four boys started to laugh out loud only beginning to imagine why on earth he had a teddy bear but quickly stopped when Secutus Avery came in and glared around the room for the source of the voices. He walked around the room and came within an inch of them during his quick survey of the room but when he found that no one was there he just left the room leaving the four boys alone once again.
"That was close." Peter said, as the boys let out a sigh of relief not realizing they had been holding their breaths in the first place and then made themselves comfortable leaning against the back wall of Snape's room.
The others nodded at Peter's words after they had been processed fully and waited patiently for Snape to make his appearance. They didn't have to wait any extensive period of time before the greasy haired boy strode into his room. James felt his mouth drop at the site he saw, not entirely sure if anyone should see such a thing as this. Yet, at the same time all four boys could not pry themselves away from the site as they cast the spell that would be documenting this whole event until they decided it should stop. But with every move the boy made it was harder for them to refrain from going into hysterics, no wonder he didn't have any friends!
The show was cut short when a very angry Avery, who stormed into the room making Snape go incredibly red in the face, yelled at Snape for being an idiot. The four boys chose that time to exit the room without disturbing anyone by making a door open for no real reason at all. They ran out of the Slytherins common room not caring if anyone heard them now that they had accomplished their ultimate goal. Once they were safely outside of the room and away from the dungeons they burst out laughing, they were practically on the floor with tears rolling down their faces as they made their way to their own common room.
*****
In late October the four had decided to finally use the incriminating evidence that proved the inevitable; Snape was indeed a loser. It was the night of the Halloween feast and the boys were positive that they had to show what they'd seen that fateful September night then. That way they were guaranteed that everyone would be there to see "Snape's episode" as they had now begun to refer to it as.
They had horded the information they had gathered for far to long, telling themselves that it wasn't the "perfect time" to show it yet, or they needed to lie low for a while because they had managed to receive another detention (James and Sirius now had a running count on who would have more by the time they graduated. Sirius was winning 25 to 10.) Remus had managed to get another bout of the flu and Sirius and James had had totake him down to the Infirmary after Defense Against the Dark Arts the week before. When they had taken him to Madame Pomfrey, though, she had said something along the lines of, Remus should have come to her sooner, which both boys thought this was very strange but just shrugged it off. It was probably just Madame Pomfrey being fussy, as she typically was about things like this.
But now that everyone was in good health and they had spent many nights in their dorm room laughing at the scene they had seen a million times before, which they all knew was the real reason they had kept the "episode" to themselves, they had decided to share the joy. They had sat down the night before and decided that during dessert at the feast they would share their little secret with the school. A little trick while they had their treats. Only they didn't want to be found out, so that made things a little more complicated. Either way it was going to happen that night and it was going to be good! Snape was going to be so sorry he'd ever messed with any of them.
They went down to dinner and sat down next to Lily Evans and the Weasleys, trying not to look like they were up to anything, which amazingly had proven not to be difficult at all. By this time all of the boys had grown quite good at acting normal in the midst of being little pranksters at work.
They ate their dinners in the midst of conversations about the Chudley Cannons (Sirius' favorite team, which James despised with a passion) and how they had started yet another losing streak, Sirius was only too pleased to start his ranting about how exactly they could make a winning team again. James also was kind enough to point out that Sirius had never seen them as a winning team because the last time they had won a game was in 1892, Sirius just glared at his best mate and continued on with his rant.
It was only too soon before they had started on dessert and with a few simple looks at each other Severus Snape's fate was sealed. Remus uttered the spell as quietly as he could without anyone noticing and soon the enchanted ceiling changed from its deep navy blue color with its dusting of sparkling stars that matched the real outdoor scene exactly, to the interior of Snape's room. It took the students a while before they even noticed the change but as soon as Snape came into the image he had everyone's attention.
James looked over at the Weasleys as Snape's image started to dance with nothing but a towel wrapped around his waste with wet hair dripping down his back. They all seemed to be enjoying the seen as Chris pointed openly at the sight and made his own comments to his brothers. James chuckled to himself as they all laughed openly.
Sirius leaned into them and smiled smugly, "At least we know now that he does wash his hair."
The four boys chuckled and Peter added, one of his few clever moments, taking a leaf out of James' book. "It may be only once a month but at least he does wash it." They laughed again as the image of Snape picked up a hairbrush and started to hum to himself as he brushed his hair and pulled it back into a slick ponytail at the nape of his neck. The students around them began to laugh and point plainly at the scene, as the boys humming became words.
Severus Snape was standing in front of everyone, be that not of his own free will, singing, "I'm pretty, yes, oh so pretty." As he danced around his room grabbing his pajamas from his bed stand and put them on, as his original song became a very deranged version of the Beatles song "Help."
"Help, I need somebody,
Help, not just anybody,
Help, you know I need someone, help."
It was the funniest thing any of them had ever seen before they had showed the school, and they had spent plenty of their own time reliving that moment. They had thought nothing could beat the real thing, but now that it was spanning the width of the enchanted ceiling the four boys couldn't help but laugh along with their fellow classmates. Then out of nowhere after humming the first verse (obviously he didn't know all of the words) he struck up opening lyrics for the bridge in a high squawky voice.
"Help me if you can, I'm feeling down
And I do appreciate you being round.
Help me, get my feet back on the ground,
Won't you please, please help me."
Then Avery walked into the room just before he even got the chance to go into an even worse version of the chorus again. The poor boy whipped around so quickly that he didn't even have time to compose himself as his face turned the darkest shade of crimson anyone had every seen.
Remus leaned in. "Didn't know he could be any color aside from a pasty white."
Sirius chuckled. "Yeah," He then nodded towards the Slytherin table where Snape sat next to Avery and a few other Slytherin boys that he, no doubt, shared a room with. Snape though did not look pleased; actually you could barely see the top of his forehead, that was threatening to break the previous record for blushing, as he sank into a bigger slouch apparently trying to hide under the table. "Doesn't look so smug now, does he?" Sirius finished very proud of himself.
As the image faded back into the black night sky, chatter broke out across the hall and Snape took this as his only chance to depart from the Great Hall, leaving his dessert untouched. Everyone else seemed to be both baffled and amused at how someone could have managed this and the four boys made a quick check at the teachers table to make sure no one was looking at them as they started to swap high fives underneath the table. Dumbledore quickly ordered the hall to remain quiet, after he consulted Professor McGonagall about something, probably about "Snape�s incident." He congratulated the pranksters for their enthusiasm but encouraged "whoever it was," though the old man was looking directly at the four of them (all of which looked forward as if nothing had happened), to come forward. Once no one did he sighed outwardly and told the students, as a whole, they should refrain from making such trouble and then he bid them all goodnight.
Peter was the only one who seemed remotely stressed by this fact. "You think he knows?"
Remus nodded. "I think he knows everything that happens here."
Sirius sighed at his two friends, he honestly didn't care, he would probably be concerned if they had gotten caught but since they hadn�t he just wanted to drop the subject. "He didn't stop us, did he?" No one answered. "There, we didn't get caught, that's all that counts."
James led the way to the common room, offered the password, and went inside. The room was empty except for Lily Evans and a few Weasleys, who sat talking enthusiastically with each other. Sirius, Remus, and Peter all decided they wanted to go to bed but James found he wasn't tired so he unconsciously looked over to where Lily was sitting on the couch. He enjoyed talking with her and found that over the last month if he could get alone with her or even just say "hello" it would make his day. Sirius had continued to make snide comments about the two of them "getting together" but James didn't want that he was just fine being friends with the young girl. He honestly didn't want anything else. James walked over to her and sat down next to her a smile planted firmly on his face as he greeted her. "Hi."
"Hi." She retorted non-enthusiastically.
James didn't know what to make of this. "What's wrong?"
She looked at him with this glare that seemed to say, 'you should know' and he suddenly understood. "It was you, wasn't it?" She said almost as if she was disappointed in him and he nodded. "Why?"
He didn't understand why she was upset by this it was just fun and games no real harm had been done. "Snape is a insufferable prat." He said clearly by means of an explanation hoping that that would be enough of an answer.
Lily nodded. "I can't say that I don't agree with that, but you still shouldn't have done that." Then a smile teased at the corners of her mouth defeating her plan of being 'the sensible one'. "It was funny though."
James laughed at the sudden change in her mood. "Yeah, it was, and if you're worried about another incident with Snape, we only finish what he starts. So if something happens that's like what happened tonight just know that he deserved it." He looked into her eyes. "Its our form of justice."
She chuckled slightly and looked down at the small watch, obviously it was wizard made do to all of the different knobs that hung on the edge of the small circular face, that hung on her wrist and she let out a sigh. "I should be going to bed." She said softly giving James one last smile before she stood up from her position on the couch. He nodded and walked her to her staircase, without thinking twice about it, and then after she had disappeared from view he hurried up the staircase that lead to the boys dormitories.
He managed to get into his room without making too much noise, and once inside the safety of his room he found his three friends already tucked away in their beds. Remus was fast asleep, probably because he'd spent all of last week in the hospital with his sister and James had to admit that would make someone long for sleep, Peter was lying with his eyes shut his breathing was soft but since he wasn�t snoring James knew he wasn�t asleep yet, and Sirius was wrestling with his sheets trying to get comfortable, as he had done for as long as James could remember. It was just another typical night in the boy's dormitory, nothing special was going to happen tonight, they'd done their job and made the students laugh a bit in the process of the days event, that was all they could ask for (aside from getting through to Snape.) James went to sleep with the pleasant thoughts floating through his head about his first Halloween feast.
~*~*~*~
Okay, I have to thank my friend Kara for helping me with this bloody prank�cuzz I over thought it when I was planning things and she helped me find my way back to ground one. I�d also like to thank everyone who�s reviewed thus far on my story�I love you all for everything. More of this story is on its way but I�ve been busy with other things�vacation�family�mourning over a certain characters demise�yeah�fun stuff like that. Oh, and this will be my last Authors note until it is absolutely necessary for me to write another one. Like I said in the first chapter�I hate these things.
