No Students Out Of Bed

Four fifth year boys sat in Professor Mcgonagall's office on the night of April 1st. Four Gryffindor boys that occupied the seats in her office so often, they had an unofficial seating plan. From left to right sat James Potter, Sirius Black, Peter Pettigrew and Remus Lupin, collectively known as the Marauders. Their faces all registered varying degrees of fear; Pettigrew looked about ready to keel over, Lupin looked rather ashamed, and Mr Black looked mostly proud but a little nervous.
Then there was James Potter, who did nothing to conceal the smirk of absolute triumph that occupied his face. Minerva leaned forward in her seat on the other side of the desk to try and deduce even the smallest inkling of fear behind his gleeful eyes, but to no avail.
'That boy is as insufferable as they come.' The professor thought, sighing inwardly. Then, out loud, she suddenly snapped,  "Mr Potter! You would do well to swipe that smug smirk off your face. I hope you realise the magnitude of your actions tonight, boys. Never - never- in all my years of teaching at this school, have I bared witness to so many acts of random defiance by one set of students. I hope you four realise all the trouble you've caused tonight. And the planning of this act wasn't exactly thought through. I would have expected better from you, Remus."
The tall, skinny boy on the far right looked as if he wanted to speak, but bit his tongue.
"To choose tonight of all nights for this prank? This is the only night in the entire school year that your house prefect checks on the students in their dorm rooms. This is the only night you would have been caught! Had you chosen any other night... I suppose you wanted to be caught. Seeking glory or a reputation among your classmates? Well, your fellow Gryffindors won't be proud of you when they find out I've deducted 50 points from you each, for the violation of our most vital school rules -"
"But we didn't break the rules" Sirius suddenly exclaimed.
"Mr Black, if you are under the illusion that children are allowed to go roaming the castle late at night, floating through the hallways on their dormitory room beds, then you are most entirely mistaken-"
"But that's why it's so brilliant," This was James now, "Technically, we're not disobeying any kind of order or regulation."
"I will have you know-" But Minerva was cut off yet again, this time by Remus.
"He's right. The school rules clearly state that-"
"No students out of bed after curfew" Peter interrupted suddenly, barely containing his laughter.
Mcgonagall narrowed her eyes at the students. "Boys, I don't know what you're trying to do but you just provided me with the exact rule that lands you in trouble tonight. The rule says "No students out of bed after curfew", which is 10 o' clock, "and no students out of bed before 6 am". You four were found roaming the corridors at twelve minutes past midnight. Seeing as you so kindly provided me with the exact nature of your crime-"
"But we didn't break the rules! Don't you see? Students can't leave their beds and we were in our beds the whole time!" James Potter leant back in his chair looking unimaginably proud of himself. Sirius, and even Remus and Peter all looked rather satisfied. Minerva opened her mouth to form a retort, but she stopped. However unbearably presumptuous and troublesome these four boys were, they were clever. That she could not deny. The head of Gryffindor fought back an amused smile that began to curl at the edges of her mouth.
"I assume the devising of this cunning plan was down to you, Mr Lupin." Remus looked half guilty, half pleased. "But I'd wager the idea belonged to one of you two vagabonds," She continued, gesturing to Sirius and James who were practically grinning.
James looked as if he was taking credit for the crime of the century. "That's right, Professor. And we knew you'd find it funny -"
"Let's not get ahead of ourselves, Mr Potter. Remember the situation you're in. Any other professor would have expelled you by now. I'm sure you are just dying to tell me every detail of this covert operation, so I will give you exactly 20 minutes to tell me everything; the planning and the events of tonight. Go"
All four boys looked at each other with glee, wondering where to start.

"You go first, James. You had the idea in the first place" Sirius encouraged.
James didn't need much encouragement and proceeded swiftly. "I got the idea about a month ago. The Common room has a framed piece of parchment depicting every single school rule there is, and me and Sirius were having a competition to see which of us had broken the most..." He trailed off looking warily at his teacher, who watched him with a stern, undecipherable expression. He decided to carry on. "Well, we got to that rule saying no students could be out of bed after curfew. And I said, isn't that funny wording? Imagine if we could stay in our beds but leave the dorm room at night. And then it hit me! We could go anywhere in the castle, do anything, as long as we never left our beds!"
"The execution of the task was fairly simple," Remus cut in to explain the mechanics of it all. "All we had to do was wait until about 11, when everyone was asleep. Then we would use a simple levitational spell to lift our beds into the air, and I used a more complex charm to widen the door to fit us through and to get us through the portrait hole. Other than that it was pretty basic stuff."
"We decided to do it tonight because by the time we were caught it would be midnight, and by then it would be April 1st. So even if we were in trouble it would go down as the best April fools in all of history." Sirius smiled ruefully. "Also you will find we chose to only use two beds instead of all four of us having a floating bed each. We decided it would be easier to manoeuvre two beds around the castle than four and the rule doesn't actually say the beds have to belong to said students. It just says bed, not their own bed. So as long as we never left a bed we never broke any rule."
"Sirius and I were on one bed and James and Remus on the other. Sirius and James were steering and they got a little competitive, and well..." Peter trailed off nervously.
"That explains the damage to the suits of armour and also to one of the posts of Mr Pettigrew's bed, I presume." Minerva narrowed her eyes at them and they all looked up sheepishly. "You also woke up all the paintings on the hallway of the Hufflepuff common room and manage to somehow confuse the staircases. Now they won't connect to the corridor on the second floor. I don't know what you did to them but Rowena Ravenclaw is turning in her grave." She sighed and looked at her watch displaying ten minutes past 1. "Is that all?"
Remus quietly spoke up. "You should probably also know that Sirius put a charm on the Slytherin water fountain in the dungeons. Um, a... laxative charm..."
"Moony! What in the name of Merlin's beard did you tell her that for?" Sirius exclaimed.
"Well she was going to find out anyway and know it was us, so she might as well know now..." Remus muttered.
"Quite right, Mr Lupin. I say, boys. You really have outdone yourselves this time. Your 20 minutes are up. Now for your punishment." Mcgonagall leant back in her seat and considered their crimes. All four Gryffindors watched her nervously.

"10 points will be taken from you all for your vandalism of school property. You should all be thoroughly ashamed of your actions tonight and your troublesome behaviour. And you, Mr Lupin," Remus watched her warily as he considered what she might say. It was him who had engineered the crime and cast the charms after all. Detention? Expulsion?
"20 points.... awarded for your use of the complex widening charm. Even some Seventh year students have trouble with that particular incantation. Well done for your cleverness." Minerva gave up hiding her smile. The look of absolute shock on Remus' face showed his utter disbelief that he had just heard his teacher correctly.
"And you, Mr Potter. The ring leader..." James' face registered similar shock to Lupin's.
"1o points awarded for cunning and creativity. You can be unbearably conceited, Mr Potter. However this particular trick shows you four have ambition and intelligence that could be useful if you applied yourself more in classes. What
you lack in morals you make up for with your quick wit and determination. If anyone is to ask, I reprimanded you boys for 30 minutes about the importance of abiding by school rules and set you extra homework. Can't let anyone know I'm going soft. Well, off to bed then. Make sure your beds stay firmly on the ground and in your dormitories from now on. If I catch you roaming the castle at night again, in bed or otherwise, I shall not be so jovial about it. Oh, your beds have been transported back to where they came from. Goodnight."
None of the Marauders moved. They sat planted to their seats in complete disbelief. Were they dreaming? Their stern, no nonsense head of house had just congratulated them on their prank and only deducted 10 points from them in total. They finally came to their senses and stood up slowly then quickly scampering out of her office before she could change her mind, mumbling "Goodnight" and "Thank you" as they left. When they had finally left the office, Minerva let out a hearty chuckle she had been concealing for quite some time. She laughed for a good five minutes before sighing and shaking her head.
"Those boys will be the death of me," She whispered with a smile.

When the boys were out of the office they ran all the way back up to the Gryffindor common room, practically shouting the password and running up the stairs to their room where they all flopped on to their beds. When they had caught their breath they fell into a state of hysterical laughter, unable to believe they had just gotten away with one of their most daring tricks yet. When they had recovered James spoke through his suppressed giggles.
"I  thought we'd blown it. I thought the old hag was ready to hand us over to the whomping willow as punishment by the look on her face..."
"I don't believe it," Peter said wheezily through short breaths, barely controlling his snorts and guffaws.
"Neither can I. I thought you'd blown it for us, Moony when you told her about the Slytherin water fountain trick." Sirius grinned over at Remus who sat up cross legged on his bed.
"I thought if we admitted to that she wouldn't think it was us who put the illusion charm on the benches in The Great Hall" Remus smiled guiltily.
James gasped "I forgot about that!"
"What?" Peter and Sirius asked simultaneously.
"While you two were flying around the staircases, James and I went into The Great hall and enchanted the Slytherin benches at their table. We took away the benches and replaced them with an illusion so when they go to sit down they'll fall right through!"
"But the benches reappear as soon as they've got up after falling so it will look as if they are all just trying to get us all in trouble if they complain." James said with a laugh.
"Genius, Remus," Said Sirius, "How on Earth did you do that?"
"I've been practicing since we decided we were doing this tonight. I just hope it works this morning at breakfast." Remus checked his watch. "Holy Hufflepuff! It's almost 3 am."
"I am exhausted. Night lads" James kicked off his shoes and shimmied into the duvet. The other boys followed suit.
"Well done, everyone. Definitely a success" Sirius added, still a hint of laughter in his voice.
Remus blew out the candle.
"Mischief managed." They said in unison, before quickly drifting into sleep.