How It All Happened

A year had passed and James and his friends were entering their third year as Hogwarts students.

"We'll have to start working harder on this animagi stuff" Sirius said to James. They were alone in the compartment all the other students knew as the Marauder Compartment, waiting for the others.

"I know, but I'm often busy with Quidditch practice, and we need Remus to help us with most of our assignments, so we can't use the "study" excuse. He'd see right through it! And we have to uphold our reputation as pranksters!" James sighed.

Peter walked into the compartment with a cheerful "hey guys!" Sirius and James ignored him. They were to depressed to be cheerful.

"Maybe we should just give this idea up..." James whispered while staring at the floor like it held the secrets of the universe.

Sirius shrugged, Peter looked like he was trying to figure out the answer to a difficult Artimancy problem.

"No." Peter said quietly, but he had a strange tone in his voice.

James and Sirius looked at him, for the three years they had known Peter, never once had he stood up to James like that.

"You've never known loneliness, have you? Well I have, and Remus has, did you know that you three are the only friends I have ever made? I asked Remus and he told me you are also the only friends he's ever had. You two have always had a friend, you don't know what it's like to sit alone in your room, wishing you were outside playing with the other kids, but couldn't because you didn't fit in right? Well we know, and I'm not giving up on Remus even if you are, but we all know that I need your help. So are you his friends or not?" Peter said this very quickly, and when he stopped he sucked in his breath, and blushed scarlet.

James and Sirius were stunned. Then they realized they were prats and Peter was right, they had never known loneliness in their lives. They had lived on the same block for as long as they could remember.

"We're not quitting on Remus, no matter what it takes, we're gonna help him" James decided, then he looked at Sirius.

Sirius nodded his agreement.

"We were being prats" Sirius grinned.

"Well we always knew that, didn't we?" Remus - who had just entered the compartment - said and smiled.

"Remus!" James gasped with a horrified sort of look on his face.

"James!" Remus mocked James's voice.

"That's not funny! You nearly gave me a heart-attack!" James cried out. Then he glared at Sirius who was sitting in a pile on the floor laughing his head off.

"If it were you you wouldn't be laughing!" James continued to glare. Then an evil grin plastered itself over James's features.

"I know! Lets play 'pitch Black'" he said and looked pointedly at Sirius.

The grin on Sirius's face turned into a groan.

James pulled Sirius up and tossed him at Remus, who tossed him at Peter, who fell to the ground along with Sirius.

"OW!" Sirius yelled while rubbing his arm.

James and Remus stood by the mess that was Sirius and Peter and laughed like there was no tomorrow. They stopped laughing when the train gave a shake and they toppled over too.

The train started moving faster and soon the four marauders were sitting in the seats, but not in a pile on the floor, chatting about Hogsmade.

"I know we've been there loads of times, but wouldn't it be fun to go with the other kids?" James said. The four of them had taken a week off schoolwork last year to follow Filch around - using James's invisibility cloak - and discovering all the secret tunnels and passages, Filch knew about. In the process they had found a tunnel that led to Hogsmade. It was behind a banner... James was snapped out of his thoughts.

"I don't like to think about what it would be like to go to Hogsmade along with those stinky Slytherins" Sirius said.

"I'm not looking forward to go share the town with you people and the Mudbloods either" A very unwelcome voice stated.

Sirius stood up along with James and the others and said, "Get out of our compartment Snape" he spat the name out as if it were a dirt.

"Your compartment? I don't see your name on it" he drawled.

"Hey Sev! Come take a look at Frank! Malfoy cursed his nose off!" A Slytherin boy named Avery, called.

Snape turned and walked away as fast as he could without running.

"Who's Frank?" Peter asked

"I think they might be talking about that sixth year Hufflepuff... Longbottom, was it?" James thought outloud as he hurried out of the compartment.

"Wait!" Sirius whispered and followed.

Remus opened his trunk and fished out a book.

Peter sat down and looked at the trees speed past the train window.

"You guys!" Sirius moaned as he returned pulling Peter and Remus with him.

They arrived at the scene, where the sixth year had indeed had his nose cursed off. It seemed Malfoy had attacked him from behind with the jelly-leg curse and then he had taken the nose off the other boys face. A number of Slytherins were laughing at the boy, pointing and making fun of him.

A girl, who was in the same year as the boy, and in Hufflepuff was desperately trying to help him, but she kept missing with her counter charms, which only helped the Slytherins into more gales of laughter.

Just as she was about to help him, Snape stuck his foot out and tripped her. She fell hard on her face and rose back up with a bloody nose.

Sirius jumped out and punched Snape in the face, giving him a bloody nose as well. They were struggling on the floor after a few seconds and the students rushed out of their compartments - if they weren't out there already - to stand in a circle around Sirius and Snape, yelling "fight, fight, fight"

"Stop it!" yelled a magically magnified voice over the crowd. It was the lady who pushed the food trolly around. She pulled Sirius and Snape apart and fixed her voice so it was normal again. Everyone was quiet.

"Get back into your compartments" She then said. Everyone started chatting and laughing again as they walked back to their respective compartments. Everyone except the marauders, Snape and the two sixth years Hufflepuffs. The girl had managed to fix the boy up, as well as her own nose wasn't bleeding anymore and was speaking to him in a low comforting voice. But the boy looked enraged.

"What on earth happened?" The lady asked the sixth year Hufflepuff.

"Well, a third year with blond hair, came up behind me and cursed me" The boy muttered darkly.

"Then these guys showed up ad started fighting" He said and glared at the floor.

"Why were they fighting?" the lady asked.

"He tripped me," the girl said and pointed at Snape "when I was trying to help Frank, then they started fighting" the girl finished and gestured at Sirius.

"Your head of houses shall be notified" The lady said severely. "Now, get back into your compartments, I'll be coming soon with the food, so no more fighting! Do you hear me?" The lady finished.

They all nodded and headed for their respective compartments.

When the four marauders got to their compartment, Sirius complaining about a heavily bleeding nose, split lip and plenty of bruises. They met a surprise.

"Lily" James said happily.

"Sirius!" Celestina gasped and jumped up to heal him.

James sat down with Lily and started telling her about what happened.

"Lily! I need a bit of help! I can't remember the healing charm for a split lip!" Celestina said.

Sirius was now almost back to normal, if you didn't count the split lip, that is.

Lily went into her and Celestina's compartment and fetched her wand. Then she came back and healed Sirius.

"From what James tells me, I think you were lucky he didn't have his wand!" Lily said, smiling a little.

"I know..." Sirius said and grinned. "Thanks girls" he then added, and smiled at both of them, but there was also a note of finality in his tone.

The girls caught the message and left.

"Why couldn't they stay?" James said, looking at the door.

"Yeah, you know you weren't very polite! Just heal you and leave!" Remus joked.

Sirius groaned, "What do you want me to do? Go back and get them?" then he continued "What about our reputation? If someone finds out we're letting anyone stay in OUR compartment we're doomed!" Sirius said that in a very serious tone of voice.

"Sirius! You take yourself way to seriously!" James grinned.

*

"Peter!" James called, he was returning from Quidditch practice, and was very tired and sweaty.

"what is it James?" Peter asked.

"I need the map" James panted. "I found another tunnel, but I'm not sure... It might be the same as another one..." Ever since James made that map for Peter last year - he had used Hogwarts a History to copy the ground plans - they had been adding all the secret tunnels and passages they had found. Partly for Peter and partly so they could keep track of the passages they found.

Peter nodded and went to their dorm room, returning with the map. They kept it wrapped up in the invisibility cloak, so no one would find it.

"Yay! I found a new one!" James said.

"No, look it's the same one... you just found a new entrance to it" Sirius - who had been looking over their shoulders - said and laughed.

"Don't look so disappointed, I know just the thing to cheer you up! I think we're ready to start the adjustment charms tomorrow!" Sirius said and smiled.

"You're right!" James said "that did cheer me up!" he added and grinned.

"But don't you have that game against Ravenclaw tomorrow James?" Peter asked.

"Oh no! I forgot! I was so excited about that stupid tunnel!" James said as he slapped his forehead.

"We'll just do it after the game then" Sirius said.

"Do what after what game?" Remus asked, he had just climbed in through the portrait hole and had caught the last words.

After a horrified silence from his friends he decided it was something he wasn't supposed to know about.

"The party!" Sirius said frantically.

"Yes! The party" James and Peter agreed, relieved.

"Oh, okay then" Remus said "by the way Gildroy's coming" he added and ran into the dorm room.

Remus's POV

As I entered the dorm I flung myself on to the bed. I just knew this day would come... I just always thought it would be Peter... But then again he's not a were-wolf. Their gonna do something and their not letting me in on it! That's the last straw! They've been leaving me alone a lot, I just know they're doing something behind my back! I can't believe it! They said they were my friends! All of a sudden I was torn from my thought because of the door opening.

End of Remus's POV

"Remus?" James said as he opened the dorm room door.

"Yeah" Remus answered, in a notably angry tone.

"What's wrong?" James asked, concerned.

"Like you don't know" Remus spat bitterly.

"No, I don't. What is it?" James said, he was starting to get nervous.

"You don't want to be my friends anymore... where are the others anyway?" Remus muttered, now in a sad defeated tone of voice.

"Of course we're still your friends! Are you crazy? We'd never quit on you!!! oh, and the others are stuck down stairs with Gildroy. I got away with the excuse of 'I need to change out of my Quidditch robes'" James said.

"If you're still my friends then why wouldn't you tell my what you were really talking about?" Remus asked, he sounded upset.

"Remus, you can't know that until it's ready! We're gonna surprise you! You'll love it, but if we tell you now, you wont let us do it!" James said very seriously.

"Really?" Remus said doubtfully.

"Really" James laughed.

Remus opened the curtains and smiled at James.

"Want help with the DADA paper?" He then asked.

"You read my mind!" James sighed and grinned.

"Let's go save the other guys" Remus said.

Five minutes later

"Pimples..." Sirius muttered under his breath.

"What was that?" James asked, trying to suppress the gales of laughter that were threatening to escape any second now.

"We'll curse him while he's sleeping... He'll wake up with every inch of his face covered in pimples." Sirius said darkly.

"That's a great idea!" James laughed "I'm in!" he then added.

"I'm to tired, the full moon's in a few days and then we have that detention in two days for fighting on the train, I can't believe we all need to serve detention because of Sirius! Anyway that wouldn't be a first, I need to rest." Remus yawned as to point out how tired he in fact was.

"I couldn't sleep last night" Peter said in a small, embarrassed voice.

"I made a very long lasting wakefulness potion, yesterday in Potions" Peter blushed.

"Then it's just you and me ol' pal" Sirius said and slapped James on the back so he stopped breathing for a moment.

"yeah, as long as you never do that again!" James said and glared at Sirius, who was calmly biting his nails.

"Really Sirius! I wish you wouldn't do that! It's a filthy habit!" Remus said.

"I don't thi... you're right." Sirius said, but kept biting his nails anyway.

Remus shook his head, while James chuckled... Peter looked confused.

"Lets go down to dinner" Peter then said.

The others agreed.

*

"You were wonderful!" Lily said to James, then she hugged him.

"Yeah! Great game! The way you caught that snitch was priceless! Did you see the look on the other seekers - what's his name? - face!!!" Celestina said and smiled.

The other three marauders came running and they all hugged James and congratulated him.

"It's a pity Gildroy didn't make it..." Sirius said with an evil grin.

"I heard he woke up with a bad acne" Lily said worriedly.

"Yeah, a real pity" Celestina said sarcastically.

A crowd of Griffindors caught up with them and again James was being hugged and congratulated along with the rest of the Griffindor team, which had just arrived at the scene.

"Party in the common room!!!" The new Quidditch captain yelled.

"I'll go to the kitchen" James whispered to Sirius, "you take my cloak and use the tunnel behind the mirror" he then finished.

Soon there was a huge party going in the common room.

Everyone was dancing, cause someone had managed to transfigure something into a guitar. Tina Wilson, was playing it and Celestina was singing some Muggle hit.

"I will survive! I will survive!" Celestina sang, only stopping to laugh from time to time.

"She has a great voice!" Sirius yelled at James, who nodded and and started to sing along with her.

After an hour, James, Sirius and Peter disappeared.

They went to the secret room they found in first year. Sirius found the right book, and they began chanting.

"my bones hurt!" Sirius groaned through his grimace.

"Of course they hurt! We'll have to do this once a month until it stops hurting! James said, he was frowning.

"OW" Peter managed to moan.

"Okay, I think we should stop it now" James said after glancing at his watch.

As the snuck back to the common room protected from Filch and his annoying cat/kitten with James's invisibility cloak, Sirius said, "Well at least we don't have to worry about the detention being painful... nothing can be more painful then what we just did!"

The other two agreed. They were very happy when they got to sleep that night.