SCORBUS // consider me yours.

10 | locked up

"You're fucking stupid," Scorpius laughed as he jogged down the halls. His bag was slung over his shoulder, and it bounced as he tried to gain speed.

Albus blew Scorpius a false kiss, trailing behind him. "Thank you,"

The boys had just finished their last extra curricular class, History of Magic. Today, the class had to begin after dinner, because their professor had no free time apart from then.

Dinner first, then classes? That didn't sound good to Albus. As far as he knew, Scorpius was probably the only one who had been paying attention during the class.

"And you know that I'm right!" Albus ran beside him.

"No!" Scorpius retorted. Scorpius started to advance on Albus, and their common room was only a few feet away. "The Astronomy Tower isn't locked up!"

"It said so in the textbook!"

Scorpius shook his head as Albus caught up to him. He shoved Scorpius with his shoulder, and a smile played on Scorpius' face. "Years ago, Al! That doesn't mean they're locked up now."

"It could mean that, though," Albus offered.

"No—" Scorpius stopped in his tracks. He inhaled deeply, pretending to be annoyed.

Albus stopped beside him, and Scorpius' face had a new, strange look on it. Albus could almost see the gears turning in Scorpius' head. He was thinking of what to say next.

"Why don't we go see for ourselves, then?"

"What?" Albus looked up, and immediately scrambled after Scorpius once he started walking again.

"Let's go see if we can find it," Scorpius replied, still walking ahead.

Albus cocked an eyebrow, and he had a feeling that this wouldn't be a good idea.

He agreed silently anyway.

***

Albus was wrong, naturally.

The Astronomy Tower had, in fact, not been locked up. The double doors were long and thick, but the state of the doors made it obvious that they had been guarding the entrance for a long while. The wood by the frame was cracking, but, like Scorpius said, there was no lock on either of the doors.

"You need to be very quiet," Scorpius warned, but it seemed quite obvious.

"I'm not good at that."

Scorpius laughed quietly, and immediately clasped a hand over his mouth. His long sweater sleeve drooped, swinging by his chin. Albus flicked the green fabric.

Albus and Scorpius both stood just outside of the two black, open double doors, excited and in their pyjamas. Well, if you consider the sweater that said COME AT ME, BRO on Albus' sweater, and pants that said YOU WOULDN'T DARE across the sides as "pyjamas".

A long, black staircase extended inside of the room the doors blocked. The steps disappeared as they got higher. It was around ten in the night, and the boys had to wait for hours as everybody in the Slytherin common room fell asleep before they could finally leave. Thank Merlin that their house-mates all finally did, because Albus and Scorpius could now start on their journey to try and enter the Astronomy Tower.

"So we've made it this far," Scorpius decided to say. He was trying his best to restrain himself from yelling, I told you so! "Now. . . do we go in?"

Albus shook his head. "No, Scorpius, we're not going to go in, because we came all this way and risked getting caught just to stare at a few doors for a moment."

Scorpius started to say something, but Albus' laugh overlapped his voice. The double doors shook along with Albus, causing shadows of movement to bounce across the walls.

"Let's just leave, then." Albus finished.

Scorpius shot him a sort of playful glare — whatever that was. He kept his eyes on Albus as he tried to think about what could go wrong with this idea.

"It shouldn't just be. . . open," Scorpius mused. "A Tower this priceless shouldn't be so easy to access."

"Maybe Filch forgot to lock it for tonight," Albus offered, and looked down at his shoes. Scorpius tried to meet his eyes again, but Albus seemed to be having a staring contest with the top of his sneakers. Albus must've thought that his suggestion was stupid.

"Doubt it," Scorpius shook his head.

He wanted to say more, doubt more, but he couldn't think of anything else to say.

Albus looked at their surroundings, as if waiting for someone to say, No wait! Don't go in there! "Any more complaints? No? Okay, let's go in then."