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A Rucksack Full of Filibusters


It took Frank Longbottom, Tobias Shaw, Andy Woodhouse, James Potter, Peter Pettigrew, Remus Lupin, and Sirius Black all to carry the sacks full of Filibuster’s that they had managed to collect over the course of a single day from the Gryffindors and the Ravenclaws. Marlene McKinnon had produced a box full of them. “Who knew Ravenclaws had it in’em? I thought they were all goodie-goodies!” Frank had said when Sirius invited him into the Third Years’ dormitory to look over the goods. At quarter past one, Sirius had used a charm to make the map small enough to fit in his palm to conceal it from the Fourth Year boys and by one thirty the troop of the seven of them departed the Gryffindor Common Room carrying seven sacks of Filibuster’s Fireworks over their shoulders.

It took some maneuvering to get through the castle without using the tunnels and secret passageways to avoid Filch, but after some time they managed to reach the entrance hall. Sirius motioned for the others to stand guard while he went to the huge, towering doors of the Great Hall, which were shut fast for the night. He stared up at them and reached for the large iron handle, tugging it open with all his might. The door slowly swung forward, surprisingly soundless, and he looked about inside for a moment, at the moonlit enchanted ceiling and real moonlight coming in through tall narrow windows lining both sides of the huge room. It was silent and still. Sirius waved for the others to follow as he stepped inside.

The four long house tables stood below their banners - Gryffindor, Ravenclaw, Hufflepuff, and Slytherin. It felt strange hanging a right in the doors and going toward the Slytherin table. They put down their bags and Sirius untied the top of his, taking out the first of the narrow, colorful firework stalks. He held it in his hand and grinned at the Slytherin table, his eyes glinting with amusement. “Oh bloody hell this is gonna be good,” he murmured, and he drew his wand, heading for the table. “Manere,” he said, waving his wand over the length of the firework. A gooey, clear substance appeared in the trail of the wand tip, and he bent down, laying over the bench backward so he was looking up at the bottom of the table and stuck the firework to the wood. It stayed very well. “There we are,” he whispered, and held his hand out, wiggling his fingers. “Another.” Frank Longbottom ran forward and put another firework into Sirius’s outstretched hand.

And so it went for almost an hour. Sirius moved now and then to a new location to adhere the fireworks more evenly along the bottom surface of the table, using the gluing charm to stick them on securely, being very careful to keep them far enough to the center of the table so that none of the Slytherins would feel they were there until the time had come. He snickered evilly as he aimed them all different directions.

They ran out of table far before they ran out of fireworks. “And you were afraid we might not have enough!” Sirius said, elbowing James.

“I stand corrected, mate,” James said.

Frank collected up the ones they’d unpacked and shoved them into the remaining rucksack. “Now what?” he asked.

Sirius said, “Now we go back to bed and wait. Tomorrow night at dinner…” he waved his hands up over his head with a whistle, then clapped loudly to simulate the explosion.

Normally, Remus would’ve pointed out how bloody dangerous adhering explosives to the bottom of a table and planning to set them off while people were sitting about it was. Currently, however, his back still ached from the burning salve that Madam Pomfrey had pressed against his skin and he was wearing a jumper that Sirius had tried to throw out because it’d turned green and he really didn’t give a damn if a firework blew the bits right off of Evan Rosier, so long as it meant getting back at the Slytherins for the way they’d treated him.

They turned and snuck back out of the Great Hall, James carrying the rucksack of leftover Filibuster’s, and made their way up to the stairwell.

In his excitement over the firecrackers’ installation, Sirius had forgotten to look for Filch’s location on the shrunken version of the Marauder’s Map, however.

They were halfway up the third floor flight when they heard it.

“STUDENTS OUT OF BED!” Filch shouted, his voice echoing from behind them.

“Blimey! -- Run!” Frank yelled and all seven students bolted, Filch’s footsteps banging up the stairs behind them. The three Fourth Years ran straight up the stairs and the four Third Years raced down the third floor corridor. Filch reached the landing behind them and glanced both directions, hesitating.

“Filthy Filchy,” called Sirius, trying to imitate a tone that Peeves might use - knowing how Filch detested the poltergeist, “Come and get us, you git!”

“What the bloody hell’re you thinking?” James demanded.

“That we know the passageways to hide in and Frank and them don’t,” Sirius replied, “It’s the only way for us all to escape! He’s got to follow us. We can get to the tapestry and the trophy room passageway from here no problem.”

Filch, not liking being called Filthy or a Git, turned quickly down the corridor and the four boys ran like hell down the hall, Peter skidding ‘round each corner as they raced for the tapestry. Sirius reached it first and drew it back so the other three could rush through. Peter was first, panting loudly, followed by Remus, and James, who was struggling to run as fast as he normally would with the rucksack over his shoulders. “Go,” Sirius snapped at Remus and Peter and he let the tapestry fall closed as he ran back to help James with the leftover fireworks.

Filch came barrelling around the corner. They couldn’t use the passageway now without showing Filch where it was, negating the purpose of using it altogether. So they ran, each holding onto an end of the rucksack. They reached the end of the corridor and turned, hurrying to keep their lead over Filch.

“We gotta ditch the fireworks,” James said, “They’re slowing us down.”

“Alright…” Sirius looked around, thinking quickly. “Here. In here.” He pulled James toward a toilet and they rushed through, shoving the door shut as quietly but quickly as possible so that Filch wouldn’t know where they’d gone.

He leaned against the door, pressing his ear to it, listening for Filch to go by as James stood still as possible just a couple feet away. FIlch’s footfalls echoed up the hall...past...and faded off down the hallway. Sirius breathed in relief. “That was close,” he said.

James was looking around. “We’re in a girl’s toilet.”

“Good, all the more reason nobody’ll expect we’re here,” Sirius said. “We need to get rid of the Filibusters.”

“In here? What do you think we’re going to do with them in here?” James demanded, “There’s not a lot of places to hide a bunch of fireworks, unless you plan on flushing them.” He stared at Sirius a moment, who grinned and grabbed the rucksack by it’s top and started toward one of the stalls. James’s eyes widened. “You mean to flush them? Bloody hell.” He rushed after Sirius as he dragged the rucksack to the nearest chamber pot. “Are you insane?”

“It’s the only way!” Sirius said.

“What if they get lit up?” James demanded. “You’ll implode the ruddy castle!”

“HOW? Toilets are connected to pipes and pipes are full of water and water keeps things like fire from happening, yeah? So they can’t get lit up in the pipes - obviously!” Sirius tapped his temple, “Think, Potter, think.”

James looked a little less apprehensive.

Sirius reached into the sack and grabbed a Filibuster and jammed it into the toilet, reaching for the chain and tugging so that the firework swirled and twirled in the bowl and disappeared down the pipe. James grabbed another and chucked it in and off it went. One by one, they shoved the fireworks down the toilet, flushing them away. “Seems like a waste,” murmured James sadly, watching them go.

“Yeah,” agreed Sirius. “Maybe one day we’ll go diving for them in the lake.”

“Bye fireworks,” James said.

When they’d emptied the rucksack, the toilet was flushing a bit slower than normal, but it swallowed up the last of the fireworks at last, and the boys shoved the empty sack into the rubbish, dusting off their hands.

“Alright,” Sirius said, pulling out the Marauder’s Map. “Engorgio,” he muttered, and the map grew up to it’s normal size in his hands. “That’s better, now I can see without squinting!” He looked over the map for Filch’s dot and found he was still searching the third floor, opening one door and the next a couple turns down the corridor away. “If we’re mighty quiet, we should be able to get back to the tapestry and get away,” whispered Sirius.

James and Sirius snuck out into the corridor and crept along, careful not to make a sound. They reached the tapestry and ducked behind it into the trophy room passageway.

The boys made it back to the dormitory without any further obstacles. They made sure Frank, Andy, and Tobias had made it as well before joining Remus and Peter in their room. Remus was nervously chomping his way through a Honeydukes Double Fudge bar, the chocolate smeared on the edges of his lips. “There you are!” he gasped, mouth full as Sirius and James stepped inside. “Bloody hell, I was scared you’d been caught when you didn’t catch up to us after a mo’!”

Peter said, “Where are the Filibuster’s?”

“We had to ditch them to get away from Filch!” James said with remorse.

“Flush them, rather,” Sirius said.

Remus lowered his chocolate bar from his mouth. “...flush them?” he asked hesitantly. A couple dots of chocolate fell from his cheek.

“Yeah,” James said, “In a girl’s toilet on the third floor.”

“You flushed… a rucksack full of firecrackers… down a toilet?” Remus asked.

“Sure,” Sirius answered.

Remus blinked at them. “There are so many things that could go wrong with that.”

“Nawh,” Sirius shook his head, “It’ll be fine! Don’t be such a worry wart, mate!”

But Remus couldn’t help but worry, though, a foreboding sort of feeling sinking through his belly.

Far down, down below the castle, winding about in loops and bends, the pipes stretched through the earth, bending ‘round large boulders and past underground reservoir, making it’s way down, down, out and dumping into the lake. The giant squid was sleeping at the base of the pipe, bubbles escaping from beneath him and rising to the surface. The first of the fireworks fell from the pipe and floated down through the dark water, sinking, and landing on the head of the squid. One giant eye opened and the squid’s tentacles reached up over his head, wrapping about the firecracker. Slowly he lowered it to look at the firework tube, turning it over. He was inspecting it still when the second one plopped onto his head.

Irritated, the squid grabbed the second firecracker in another tentacle, and he fluttered up to look into the pipe. A third firecracker came out and the squid breathed out in frustration, bubbles streaming from his mouth. He jabbed the firecrackers back into the pipe angrily, shoving them tightly into the base of the pipe. When they came back out, he was even more frustrated and he shoved them back in, covering the hole of the pipe with three of his tentacles, then reaching out with another and clutching a medium sized rock from a few feet away, shoving the rock into the mouth of the pipe, stopping it up completely.

Relieved he didn’t need to worry about anything else falling from the pipe, he settled back to the bottom of the lake, curling himself up in the thick weed that covered the bed, nestling into the silt and falling back to sleep.