Chapter 1 - Plots and Knowledge and Weird Code Names

Disclaimer: I own nothing. J.K. Rowling owns everything. Magic is fun. Any likeness to real events, people, or locations is strictly coincidental, or maybe I'm an obliviated magical. Or a squib. Or Luna.

They were known throughout the school as the simply The Gang. They were relentless, and skilled, their calling cards infuriatingly simple yet mind-bendingly deceptive. There was a half-dozen, at least, though possibly more, and they had emerged as a force to be reckoned with. Perhaps they weren't serious, but they were smart, and knew how to cause havoc.

Of course, when they had first emerged, everyone had assumed it was a certain set of twins. They had been, and still were, of course, the most eligible set of evil geniuses in the entire school. But they had denied involvement, and soon the Gang had established itself as an altogether separate entity. They had tried everything to sniff out the culprits – testing wands, enlisting Prefects, setting Filch on anyone suspect – not that there were many people. But everything had come back negative.

The Headmaster would have had a fit if he had realized who was behind it. Although, to be fair, with the quantity of sherbet lemons he ate, people probably wouldn't even realise he had anything worse than a case of reflux.

Right now, in a secluded classroom, at the very beginning of the school year, The Gang was having one of their meetings. Professor Vector's neat handwriting was still upon the chalkboard, but no-one would be walking in any time soon, due in no small part to Miss Pebbles's little Human-Repelling Charm. And even if anyone had walked in on them, they would have been in far too much shock to do anything, and probably would have had their memory wiped before they could muster a word.

For many of the members of The Gang were the complete opposite of what even an experienced detective would expect. Miss Pebbles had an ordinary, almost average look – not very pretty, but not ugly, either probably because she gave no attention to her appearance. Her hair was brown. Her eyes were brown. In her ordinary life, she was intelligent, and almost a goody-two-shoes. Neat. Sensible. Respectful of authority. Not the kind of girl you would expect to have cast the spell that left purple, quietly buzzing glitter in everyone's hair for weeks on end.

The boy who sat next to her on the left was even less of an interest. Mister Chompers was tall, with long features and bright red hair, but here his remarkableness ended. His face was freckled with the marks of the sun. His shoes were slightly worn and heavily scuffed. He was absolutely average at his studies, with scrawling handwriting. He loved the simple things in life – his pet. Chess. Food. Friends. Most of the teaching staff had already written him off as an okay child, but not destined for greatness. Yet here sat the mastermind behind the maze that had appeared in the corridors and made everyone late for lessons.

At Miss Pebbles's right sat the most mundane boy imaginable. Mister Honeysnout had barely made it into school. His potions tended to melt his own cauldron, or worse, explode; he struggled with many spells; he feared many things, despite his affiliation. His parents had met an unfortunate fate while he was still a baby, and it had left its mark. He was round-faced and somewhat chubby and seemed to shy away from conflict. He could not possibly be the voice that had shouted for people to understand, nor the person who had caused the torches to speak from their brackets – yet he was.

Swinging her legs from her perch on a desk was Miss Wishbone. She certainly wasn't ordinary – her hair was blonde and oddly straggly, her eyes wide, her gaze dreamy. She spent good proportions of her time in her own little world, humming to herself as she worked. She was clever, you could give her that, but strange. Prone to conspiracy theories and other strangeness, her demeanour did nothing to help her. Twin radishes – or at least, that's what they appeared to be – dangled from her ears. She had few friends and was picked on by many. And yet here sat the girl who had bound everyone together and brewed a potion that forced the staff to speak in poetry for the rest of the day.

Near Miss Wishbone, similarly on a desk but more anchored to the world sat Miss Stripes. She was a small girl, with her brother Mister Chompers's bright red hair, similarly freckled and slightly run-down. She had a personality to match her locks, fiery, not afraid to stand up and yell. She was only 13 this year, yet a proficient duellist. She spoke brashly, clearly, and had a very clear code of conduct and morality. Not the kind to hide, or to talk in a roundabout way – yet she had been the one who had suggested the calling cards, the sneaky little riddles. And she had been the one to enchant the suits of armour to spit flame behind people's backs.

Near the back of the room, absently building a house of exploding cards, was Mister Swordeye. He had been an initial suspect, with his loud personality and penchant for the mildly irresponsible but technically unpunishable. He played Exploding Snap – or poker – at the backs of class, catcalled people randomly in the hallways, and released a tarantula into a dormitory once. Something he wasn't was discreet, and after a few incidents, he had been ruled out of contention as a member of the Gang. After all, they were far too subtle, clever, and shadowy. Yet here Mister Swordeye sat, occasionally pushing his dreadlocks away from his face, putting together his house of cards, just like he put together, from his own seat at a packed table, the enchanted lines that had turned breakfast at the Great Hall into a slightly more realistic version of The Floor Is Lava.

And then there were the evil twins, leaning against the wall. Mister Brushtail and Mister Points, they were called. The final two redheads in the group, identical but for the slight variations in their freckles and eyes – but who would look at that? Like Mister Swordeye, they were loud and proud, sturdily built, absolute demons on a sporting field. They were known for their conspicuousness – they barely tried to hide their involvement in pranks, fessing up readily and often proudly. They had once promised their sister, Miss Wishbone, a toilet seat from school – she had been ten then and had found reason to laugh as her 13-year-old brothers went away to board. No-one could have guessed that Mister Brushtail and Mister Points had been the ones to engineer the trick that had swapped everyone's common room locations – heck, no-one had even noticed until someone had been screeched at by a bronze eagle near the kitchens. Most people with any sense would have realised they shouldn't just write off the nutcases as fools to boot, but then again, they played their part well.

And finally, their leader. In most of the staff's eyes, he wasn't even in contention for suspicion. He couldn't be. He was their saviour, after all. Not that they would have recognized him easily as he sat perched atop the teacher's desk. His normally scruffy, often windswept hair was neater, shining black. His eyes, though they retained their green hue, had less of the almond shape, appearing narrower in the absence of his glasses. His posture had less of a reckless slouch here, somehow sitting both straight-backed and carelessly. Yes, he had a way to become invisible, and to monitor the inhabitants of the castle, but that didn't matter. He looked up to the Headmaster like a grandfather and was brave and loyal. There wasn't a single cunning, nor hardworking, nor overly witty bone in his body. There was no way he was the one who bombarded the Headmaster himself with personal pranks – and sometimes attacks. He was a Gryffindor, through and through. Even, to Professor McGonagall's surprise, Snape agreed. Despite his mediocrity and arrogance and uselessness at potions and recklessness and bad attitude, just like his father, he was in no way involved.

And yet, there Mister Silver sat, and with what the Gang was planning, any of the adults would have put their heads in their hands and wondered what in the world happened to the wide-eyed, lion-to-the-end, Golden Boy, Harry James Potter.