Little Red |Sirius Black|

A Cute Clown- Arianna

"The Marauders knew!" I exclaimed, taking Alice by the shoulders. "I don't know how. But they knew!"

"And we would have made complete fools of ourselves by barging into McGonagall's office." Dorcas finished for me. I nodded, silently thanking the Gods that I realized this just in time. "They lied about about getting expelled. They probably just got detention or something."

"Or they didn't show her the herb to begin with." I guessed. "That's why Remus insisted on taking the others to McGonagall by himself."

"I don't think that's very likely." Alice insisted. "The scene that we witnessed in the common room could not have been fake." Lily nodded.

"Look at it this way." I said. "In all the years that you've known the Marauders, how many times have you seen them plead with someone, or publicly fight amongst themselves?"

"Never." Alice said slowly.

"That's what I thought." I said smugly.

They finally seem to get it.

"Those sons of banshees!" Lily exclaimed.

"So what do we do now?" Alice asked with a frown.

"Now we head to the Great Hall for breakfast." I said with a shrug. "The best way to react to this would be to not react at all." The girls murmured their agreements, and we were on our way.

The walk to the Great Hall was relatively quiet. We saw Vera and Mandy hovering by the Gryffindor table as we walked in. They rushed to us.

"We heard that the Marauders had Calliope's Bane in their possession. How terrible!" Mandy tutted with mock concern.

"Yeah." Vera said with a barely suppressed grin. "How irresponsible of them! Don't they realize how dangerous it is?"

"Oh, you know the Marauders." I said with a fake sigh. "They think they can do anything."

"So, what's the verdict?" Vera asked, "detention for a week? A month? The whole year?"

"Most likely, no detention at all." I sighed. "I think they knew."

"But how's that possible?" Vera asked incredulously. "We were so careful!"

"That's what I'll be finding out." I promised them. "Speak of the devils.."

It was at this point that the Marauders had decided to step in, blatantly ignoring any and all pairs of eyes that were on them.

"Hello ladies." Sirius said solemnly, as they reached us. "Are you here to join us for our last breakfast in this school?"

"Oh cut it out, Sirius." I scoffed. "We know."

He grinned at me. "We know that you know." he said smugly.

"Oh yeah?" I challenged. "Well, did you know that we know that you know that we know?"

Sirius' eyebrow shot up in amusement, and I blushed at my own stupidity.

"We did actually." Sirius said, the corners of his mouth turning up as he resisted laughing in my face.

"Never mind." I mumbled as I sat down to eat. Alice, Lily and Dorcas sat down next to me.

Today's just not our day.

The Marauders exchanged amused glances, before deciding to sit down across from us.

"Well, we're already done eating." Vera said. "We'll be in the courtyard." I nodded.

"What do we have here?" James asked, as Vera and Mandy walked away. We all turned to follow his gaze and spotted a dish covered with a fancy looking lid.

A rather suspiciously big lid.

"What's that?" Peter asked, already stretching his arm to open the cover.

"Wormtail, no!" Sirius exclaimed, the same time as I said, "Wait, don't!"

Too late, I thought to myself as about a dozen small creatures jumped out from underneath the lid. I barely had time to register anything before they started pouncing.

I caught one just as it was about to attack my face. I held onto the squirming creature, trying to examine it from as closely as I dared.

"Garden gnome." I muttered to myself, as I recognized the creatures attacking us. I could hear the Slytherins cracking up from the next table.

Then everything was crystal clear.

"Everyone!" I called out to the Gryffindors over the Gnomes' cries of war.

"What?" James screamed back, tugging at a gnome that was trying to climb up his neck.

"Throw the gnomes at the Slytherin table." I responded, already chucking the one in my hand towards the slimy bastards.

"With pleasure." Dorcas screamed. Once the initial moment of panic was over, everyone at the table began throwing the gnomes at the Slytherins. Soon enough, all the Slytherins rushed out of the Great Hall, laughing their asses off.

"You idiots." Arthur Weasley muttered, once it was relatively quiet again.

"Excuse me?" Sirius asked incredulously. I had to hold in a laugh when I noticed an angry red bite at the tip of his nose.

He looks like clown. I thought fondly. A very cute clown. A small voice from the back of my head added.

No.

"He's right. You lot have been so busy pranking each other, it's giving the other houses a chance to strike!" Frank said. "Now go and show them that Gryffindors are not to be messed with!" My eyebrows shot up.

"You're advocating pranking?" I asked him.

"Better them than us." he replied with a shrug as he got up to leave. Soon enough, the only people at the table were the Marauders, Alice, Lily, Dorcas and I.

"I think it's time to set our little squabble aside and focus on the common enemy." James said, sounding irritable as he rubbed a small bruise on his neck. "Don't you?"

The girls and I shared a long look, then nodded unanimously.

"I believe I may have a plan." I said, already planning out the finer details.

************

Belated Merry Christmas!!

I had originally planned to publish this on Christmas eve, but I started reading PoA again to do some research for Emerald.... Long story short, I ended up reading the whole book :p

Anyways,

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Love,

RJ.