James and Lupin looked at each other. They had forgotten about the prank Sirius wanted to pull, how he wasn't talking about the Joker anymore. They stopped thinking about it.
"Are we going to do that prank?" asked Lupin, not quite sure.
"Of course we are! Or do you have a better idea?" asked Sirius, with some anger, as he had seen that the others were not very much in agreement with this prank.
"If they catch us, we're screwed..." commented James, and Sirius looked at him quizzically, as his best friend always agreed and was not one to be afraid.
At that moment, a boy named Thomas with a dark complexion and short hair, staggered into the common room and finally stumbled falling to the floor, drawing everyone's attention.
James stood up and noticed that Thomas's legs were stuck together. He recognized immediately that it was the Legs Together Jinx. He had had to come hopping to Gryffindor tower.
Many of those, who saw this scene began to laugh, except for James, who went over and performed the counter jinx. Thomas' legs parted, and he was able to stand up, shaking.
"Thanks..." muttered Thomas.
"What happened?" asked James, helping him to sit on one of the couches. James had known Thomas, as he was a first year, and they had high-fived when he was almost grounded for ignoring the flight instructor's order.
"Rabastan and his friends," Thomas replied in a shaky tone, "I found them on the way out of the bathroom. He said he was looking for someone to practice his new jinx on," he added.
"Go talk to Professor McGonagall. He can't be casting jinxes while someone wants to go to the bathroom quietly," suggested Lupin, but Thomas shook his head and said, "I have no proof."
"You have to stand up to him, John!" said Sirius angrily.
"I'm Thomas..." muttered the boy, but Sirius didn't hear him and kept talking.
"That fucker. He thinks he can do whatever he wants because his family has some power," said Sirius, getting angrier and angrier.
'Some...?' thought James. Only a Black could say such a thing.
"Not everyone is like you or how James... I have to study. See you..." said Thomas as he stood up and walked away.
Sirius followed him with his eyes and said nothing. James on the other hand had already made up his mind, "Let's do it," he said, and Sirius got a smile forming on his face as he listened to him.
Rabastan was casting jinxes on many Gryffindor students, Toby was one of them, now Thomas, and tomorrow it could be another one. He had to be put in his place.
If Rabastan hadn't been such a bully, James wouldn't play such a practical joke on him, but he left him no choice.
"That's the spirit, man!" exclaimed Sirius, brutally patting James' back.
'Looks like there's no other option...' thought Lupin, but he was also looking forward to getting back at Rabastan, though this time they would be aiming for all the years.
Late at night, Sirius left the common room alone. However, he was followed by James, Peter, and Lupin, who were under the invisibility cloak. This time, Peter wanted to come along, as he was very curious about the identity of the Joker.
When they left the common room, Sirius got under the cloak, as he didn't want to run into Filch and be punished. When he was about to arrive he came out. This time, the Joker arrived within a few minutes.
"H-hi... did you bring it?" asked Sirius somewhat nervously, different from his usual confidence.
"Do you have the money?" asked the Joker. His voice was strange, very low and distorted, plus the clown mask and the darkness that was in the castle many students would get a fright if they saw him.
"Here you go," said Sirius, pulling out a small bag, which as it moved jingled. The Joker weighed the bag with his hand, glanced at it, and put it away.
"Aren't you gonna count it?" asked Sirius.
"I have my ways," he said without explaining much more. From one of his pockets. He pulled out some kind of small bag. He opened it and stuck his hand in starting to look for something.
"Mm, this isn't... where is... here!" he muttered as he withdrew a black box about six inches long. He passed it to Sirius, who took it carefully and within seconds pulled out another identical box again.
He repeated the process until Sirius had five boxes in his hands, "In each box are 20 dungbombs, of the highest quality," said the Joker.
Sirius nodded without seeing what was in the boxes, as it would be rude, and he trusted the reputation of the best smuggler of prank products at Hogwarts.
"If you need anything else, you know how to contact me," said the Joker as he chuckled in a low tone and started walking backward disappearing into the darkness.
"How scary..." muttered Peter, who got to hear the Joker's laughter.
...
In the marauders' bedroom, five boxes could be seen lined up on the coffee table and opened. Leaving tiny brown spheres, barely the size of a marble, that fit comfortably in the palm of one's hand. Their simple, unassuming appearance is deceptive, for when they burst they give off a putrid, stinky odor.
The five boys stood watching with smiles at the boxes full of dungbombs, "They'll have to bathe for months, and the smell will haunt them," said Sirius with a big grin.
"I've never seen so many stink bombs together," commented Peter, amazed at the great sight.
"There are still a few things missing before we act," said Lupin.
"What's missing? We just sneak into the Slytherin common room with James' cloak and bomb them, easy," said Sirius.
"If we do what you say, all we'll get is easily caught. First of all, if we are under the cloak, how will we throw the bombs without being seen by all the people who are going to be in the common room? Secondly, if we manage to figure that out when we leave the common room after throwing 100 dungbombs, we will have a putrid smell and it will be easy for them to figure out it was us," explained Lupin calmly, and Sirius began to understand that it wasn't all that simple.
"Won't the cloak protect us from the smell?" asked Toby, to which James shook his head.
"It's only an invisibility cloak. It won't protect against rotten smell..." said James a little doubtfully.
"We'll do the following. Toby, Peter, and I will take care of finding a solution for the smell problem so it doesn't affect us. James and Sirius will look for the solution so that we won't be seen and we can throw the dungbombs once we are in the Slytherin common room," said Lupin, and everyone nodded in agreement.
'I thought he didn't agree with the prank...' thought James, looking strangely at Lupin.
After talking about a few more things, they went to sleep, since it was very late and tomorrow besides classes they had to start looking for solutions so that the prank would turn out perfect and they wouldn't get caught.
A week passed since the day they got 100 dungbombs.
The marauders' outings to explore the castle began to be less and less, as they were absorbed in getting the answers to the two questions of the prank. Plus James was spending time studying and didn't have as much free time as he used to.
On the one hand, Lupin, Peter, and Toby were spending more time in the library looking for methods that would protect them from the rotten smell. They had already decided that they would do it through a potion, which would have a longer-lasting effect compared to a charm.
The problem was to find a potion that was not something very used, and they did not even know if it existed, so they spent a lot of time reading potion books.
Sirius and James thought they had it easier, but so far they did not find any method that would allow them to throw the dungbombs without being seen by the people in the Slytherin common room, since for this they would need to get out of the invisibility cloak.
Sirius suggested a Polyjuice potion. This potion is well known, it allows the drinker to assume the form of another person. It is a complicated and challenging potion that even adult witches and wizards struggle to brew correctly.
James dismissed this idea quickly. He knew the potion, and it was too much trouble, although he was confident he could make it, they needed a lot of ingredients that were very hard to come by. They even needed hairs from the person they were going to transform, which added another problem to the matter, as they had to get hairs from three Slytherin students.
And the worst part of all was that the potion must be cooked for a month before use. Hearing this, Sirius rejected the proposal he had made as he was unaware of this step.
James knew the answer was through a charm. Despite knowing many charms, he knew none that would help him in this situation. Most of the charms he knew were attack and defense. Then the typical ones like Alohomora, Reparo, Lumos, etc.
"Looks like you have no choice but to visit the library..." said James as he walked into the Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom.
James was already visiting the library and was reading more advanced books on defensive magic. But since the assignment is both of theirs, he won't be doing all the work by himself.
"Yes..." said Sirius with a grimace, as he wasn't a big fan of visiting the silent library. Despite not going to the library regularly, Sirius was very talented and good at most subjects.
He didn't see why he should visit it, and he didn't understand James, who now visited regularly either, but everyone does what they want with their time.