Reggo My Eggo

Chapter 31

The three teens decided to leave the banner as it was and just decorate the poster by stepping in the red ink while in their animagus so that now the banner had dog and caribou paw prints all over it. They decided they'd ask peter to add rat prints the next morning, deciding against waking him up. 

"Now it looks like there are bloody paw prints all over the banner," James grimaced. 

"This might not have been our best idea," 

---

Students were set the head out for Yule break in only a couple of hours. Regulus was packing his suitcases to bring back home for the holidays while Barty was laying on his bed, talking to Regulus as he packed his things. 

"Aren't you going to get started on packing?" Regulus asked. "You're heading back home in a few hours too,"

"I was starting to think I'd just stay here instead, I'm sure my old man could survive one Christmas without me," Barty shrugged.

"So you're just going to abandon me? You're supposed to be staying for dinner over break, don't bail on me now," It was a tradition in their families to host a dinner between the two families before Christmas. Every year they alternate whose house it would be hosted at, last year it was hosted by the Crouch family making this year the Black families turn to host.

 The diner was never anything too special, just the usual roast and chit-chat that lasted for hours, these dinners were how Barty and Regulus had originally become friends. 

Right about now, in the Gryffindors sixth-year boys' dorms, the four marauders sat on the floor, leaning against the closest beds discussing their plans for the break. 

The four boys had already planned out their pranks and they were all set to be set up throughout the school. Most of the pranks would be set up early on in the break depending on how many people decided to stay over the holidays, they couldn't allow someone to accidentally set off one of their larger pranks, but it may be amusing to watch students set off some of their smaller pranks throughout the holidays.

"Pete, you think you can sneak into the other houses' common rooms to set up the pranks?" James asked. 

The boys had already planned most details out, Sirius would set up the pranks targeted to the teachers, Remus would set up the pranks in the great hall and James would set up the pranks that would be placed in the doorways, he was also in charge of marked down which doorways were tampered with so they'd know to avoid them. All they needed now was for Peter to use his rat animagus to sneak into the different common rooms and set up the last of the pranks. 

"O-oh, I was actually planning on heading home," Peter squeaked out. 

"I thought we were all going to stay back this year?" Sirius looked kind of disappointed. They've been planning this out for weeks, the four marauders would have the whole school to plot and set up for the coming week. 

"It was last minute," Peter said quietly. 

"It's fine. We'll manage, you'll still be back after the holidays and we can send plenty of letters back and forth for the next two weeks," Remus smiled gently.  

"I can do Wormtails job, a dog sneaking into the common rooms has a better chance at going unnoticed than a caribou does," Sirius offered, propping himself up with his elbows. 

"I am not a caribou!" James whined. 

"That's because you're a reindeer" Peter chimed in, no one can convince Peter that caribou and reindeer are the same animals. 

"You're actually a moose, but believe what you want," Remus gaslighted. 

The group of friends had gone over this discussion many times by now. James claimed he was a deer but Peter had decided that he was a reindeer. Sirius votes that he's a caribou, mostly because that's what Remus told him that James was, although ever since this debate had started, Remus had switched to telling James that he's actually a moose. 

"I am a deer, the dearest of all deers if you will," James tended to get sensitive over the whole 'what animal is James' topic. 

"Again, you can believe what you want but have you ever actually looked in a mirror while in your animagus form? You do know that there are other animals with antlers too, right? You could be an elk now that I think about it, maybe even a pronghorn," Remus pondered, anything to make James go mad. 

"I'm a deer, stop making up random animals. I'm a deer!" James claimed. He was now full-on sitting up, ready to transform into his deer animagus to prove it.

Time flies by fast when you're antagonizing James. In a blink of an eye, hours had passed and students were piling out of their common rooms, dragging their luggage out of the castle. 

Peter was already mostly packed since the night before so all he had to do was grab his toiletries and stuff them into a bag before he was out the door, he didn't bring much, insisting that he had plenty of belongings at home waiting for him. 

Regulus managed to convince Barty to not turn back on his plans to head home for the holidays, so now the two Slytherins were following the crowd out of the school and towards the carriages that would take them to the train. 

Regulus had left without being able to say bye to his brother but he preferred it that way. If he had to speak with his brother he'd also have to speak with James who was by his side 24/7. On top of all that, whenever he saw his brother, his mind kept going back to something James had said. 

He kept remembering how James had blurted out a bunch of random bullshit including how he only hung out with him because Sirius asked him to. He didn't believe it, he didn't want to believe it but what he did believe was that it was something that Sirius would do but he doubted it would have been kept a secret for the past five years, none of the marauders are good at keeping secrets, oddly enough, not even Remus, even though he had the biggest secret to keep, Regulus had still figured it out in no time.

What Regulus didn't know was that three of the marauders already had plans to kidnap him on day three of the Yule break. 

It took a lot of convincing, but James managed to convince his friends that they should take Regulus back and once and for all make sure he was to never return back to the horrid manor. 

James was hoping to be able to take advantage of the break and use it as a chance to speak to Regulus about things and hopefully, he would listen and not run away like he's kept doing whenever he's been trying to talk to him so far. 

Sirius gave in quite fast as he wanted his brother safe but he was hesitant about the idea of breaking back into the Black manor, none less, they'll be flooing into the manor and making an immediate run for it as the sound of the floo system will alert someone of their arrival. 

From there they'd get Regulus from his room and bring him back to school with them. The three boys made up this plan late one night when Peter was asleep. The plan was to get Peter to help with the mission but as he will be returning home for the holidays, that's no longer an option.