All the Young Dudes ( Sirius' Perspective )

Fifth Year : Dung Bombs & Broom Cupboards

No moon at all

What a night

Even lightning bugs have dimmed their lights

Stars have disappeared from sight

And there’s no moon at all

Don’t make a sound

It’s so dark

Even Fido is afraid to bark

What a perfect chance to park

And there’s no moon at all

 

Monday 23rd February 1976

It started with a tried-and-tested classic: dung bombs. Throughout the numerous years of pranks, the marauders had found that nothing was quite as reliable when it came to causing chaos as the powerful little incendiaries. But of course, they couldn’t just repeat the mischief of previous years; James and Sirius competed to see how many dung bombs they could acquire (amassing four hundred, between them), Remus had been working on a timing delay spell that he was keen to try out, and they all agreed that the legwork would have to take place after curfew.

Sirius was eager to put their plan into action as soon as possible—unfortunately, that didn’t turn out to be very soon. It took quite a bit of nagging to get Remus to agree to forgo homework for an evening, and even then, he refused to abandon his prefect duties. This meant scheduling around the prefect patrol rota, which might have been fairly simple—if not for Potter’s ridiculous quidditch practice schedule. And, of course, there was the full moon to contend with. In the end, it wasn’t until late February that all four marauders were present and accounted for, gathered around James as he shook out the invisibility cloak.

“Been a while!” he said, broad grin disappearing as he pulled the cloth over his head.

Peter transformed into a rat and settled down comfortably onto James’s shoulder, squeaking. Sirius and Remus ducked under the cloak, as well, but quickly encountered difficulties as they tried to manoeuvre the cloth to cover all of their feet.

“You two use the cloak,” Remus said, sighing as he ducked back out, “I’ll just flash my prefect pin if anyone asks what I’m doing.”

“Takes all the fun out of it, though,” Sirius grumbled, pouting slightly. It was supposed to be like old times—all of them squished together, whispering and shushing each other as they tried to shuffle through the halls.

“I’m sure you’ll still find a way to have fun,” Remus said dryly, “Come on then.”

They exited the dorm, making their way slowly down the stairs of Gryffindor Tower. Though Sirius was disappointed that they weren’t all getting the complete pranking experience, he had to admit that it would have been a bit of a headache to navigate with three of them squeezed under the cloak. He and James were slow enough as it was, and Remus had to shorten his long stride just so that they could keep up.

“Hiya, Remus!”

They had just turned a corner when an irritating, chirpy voice interrupted them. Through the fabric of the cloak, Sirius could see that Moony had been halted by the scrawny git from his study club—what was his name?