Operation Get Crane Back
It was so close… they could envision it right before their eyes. If everything went perfectly… They hoped everything would go perfectly. If that happened, they may never dread going into the Defence Against the Dark Arts classroom again. Their plan wasn’t foolproof, they were all aware of this. There was a certain amount of caution they had to maintain while executing it. For instance, their idea of creating a chilling tale to narrate while Crane was around had to be done vigilantly; if Crane caught them being too specific he would know what was going on. They had to be evasive. They weren’t sure how to do this exactly. They had thought it would be best to use Lily and Alice, as their faces carried much innocence. Then they thought that they could use Remus and Peter, who were both exceedingly good at acting blameless. In the end, they decided that it would be best to use Jacob, Julie and Andy. They had been at the school the longest and could make their story sound most convincing.
It would be done casually, during a time when Crane could be seen leaving his classroom to go to the Staff Room. They usually saw Crane emerging right before third period on Tuesdays; always wearing a smug expression on his face (he had a class of Ravenclaw first years on that day and he enjoyed frightening them). Jacob, Julie and Andy would wander by, going considerably out of the way of their normal path to Herbology, and they would stage the conversation in voices that weren’t overly loud, but loud enough for Crane to hear them. It wouldn’t be suspicious for three seventh years to be talking about something such as the Defence Against the Dark Arts position being cursed. They had been at school long enough to know if it was. The first years, who had History of Magic after passing, would hang back and watch. Professor Binns wouldn’t notice if they were late.
The Gryffindor first years stood off in the shadows, watching the backs of Jacob, Julie and Andy as they weaved in and out of the oncoming students. They couldn’t fully hear what they were saying from the distance they were at, but they caught bits and pieces.
“Did you hear about…?” Jacob said seriously to his friends.
“The Defence Against the Dark Arts teachers?” they could hear Julie reply in a politely interested voice.
“The curse?” Andy said, carelessly glancing toward Crane’s classroom.
As the three seventh years advanced further up the corridor, the first years could no longer hear much of what they were saying. They wanted to inch a bit more along the hallway, but their chances of being spotted by Crane would be increased. So, trusting that the seventh years had performed their task admirably, they continued on to History of Magic. As they continued on their way, however, they did manage to catch a glimpse of Crane, who looked very much like he was about to start panicking. Maybe this was going to work.
“Knight to E5,” Sirius instructed his knight as he challenged Peter to Wizards’ Chess. James, Sirius, Peter and Remus were sitting in the common room that night, waiting patiently to see their counterparts in Operation Get Crane Back. They had not seen Jacob, Julie and Andy since they went off down the corridor outside of Crane’s room, and they were eager to find out exactly how Crane reacted. James and Remus turned to watch Sirius’s knight crush Peter’s pawn, grinning slightly at the squeals of terror coming from the piece.
“Do you think they’ll be up here soon?” James asked, glimpsing towards the common room entrance. His friends shrugged. They knew the three must still be in the Great Hall. They would come up whenever they finished eating dinner.
“I think they did a good job,” Remus said, scratching out a bad sentence in his Potions essay. “You saw Crane’s face, didn’t you?”
“Looked like he could’ve been sick,” Sirius laughed, scooping up the broken pieces of one of his rooks and dropping them in the box.
“When are we destroying his room?” Peter asked, directing one of his pawns across the board.
“Not destroying,” James said in a mock hurt voice. “We’re… changing it a bit.”
“So we’re destroying it, then?”
“We don’t want to say that out loud. But we’re doing it on Friday.”
“No, we’re not,” Remus said, looking up from his homework. “That’s when it’s happening; we’re doing the actual work on Thursday night.”
“Which would technically be Friday, since we’re doing it past midnight.”
“Yeah, yeah. So has everyone gotten their spells down?”
“I do,” the three boys replied at once.
“What about Lily, Alice and Frank?”
“Lily’s known hers since the day we showed it to her,” James said admiringly.
“Frank’s almost got his. He just needs to fix it up a bit,” Sirius said, frowning as Peter declared checkmate.
“Alice told me she knows hers,” Peter said, smiling in triumph as he won the match of chess.
“We’re doing this in shifts, right?” Remus asked, placing his sheet of parchment in his Potions notebook.
“Yeah, except you,” James answered. “You’re staying there the whole time, so you can figure out when everything is going to happen.”
“Lucky me.”
As the boys were getting ready to go upstairs and put their belongings away the entrance to the common room opened and the seventh years strode in, all looking rather pleased with themselves. They spotted the boys and gestured for them to follow them. They led the boys over to a secluded section of the room and told them, in hushed voices, that they had successfully managed to convince Crane that soon all hell would ensue in his classroom.
“He’ll be handing in his resignation by Friday evening,” Andy reported gleefully.
Remus sat in the pitch-black Defence Against the Dark Arts classroom at one in the morning, safely hidden under a desk. He had just assisted Lily, Frank and Alice in setting up their hexes and jinxes and he was now waiting patiently for Jacob, Julie and Andy to arrive under James’s Invisibility Cloak. They had all been surprised when James produced a silver, liquid-like cloak that evening when they had been discussing how they would get from Gryffindor Tower to the classroom. They had originally decided on going one by one, so it would be easier to get away if they were caught. Luckily, James’s father had given James his old cloak for Christmas.
Remus was not at all comfortable, nor was he feeling very brave. They had to stop five times because they could have sworn they heard someone approaching the room. It only turned out to be the wind and the castle making noises, but it was unnerving nonetheless. He peered out from under the desk and squinted through the darkness before remembering that it was useless. He wouldn’t be able to see them coming because of the cloak. He had to wait for the signal “ a low whistle, then a high one, then a low one. He crawled back into his hiding place and waited once more. Two shifts left, he thought, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes. He was tired; he just wanted to go to bed.
Faintly he could hear the signal issued - the seventh years had arrived. They had to walk carefully, as they were bringing the crate of fireworks. The door to the classroom clicked and opened as quietly as the seventh years could manage. One of the most important instructions Remus had been given was to lock the door every time a shift left. It would look too suspicious if the door was kept unlocked. Remus could barely see the three pairs of feet walk by the desk, but he now knew they had taken the Invisibility Cloak off. He backed out from under the desk and stood up, causing Julie to gasp in surprise.
“Sorry,” he whispered, straightening out his robes.
“Its fine,” she said quickly, pulling her wand out and looking around. “Where do we begin?”
“Well, Frank put a Levitation Charm on the stuff on Crane’s desk, so that’s done with,” Remus said, looking around and recalling what had already been jinxed. “That happens first. Lily and Alice hexed the windows so they open and close by themselves, that happens after what Frank did.”
“I’m supposed to set up the fireworks,” Jacob said, lifting up a particularly heavy looking crate. “Where should they go?”
Remus shrugged. “Anywhere except that desk,” he said, jerking his head towards his hiding place. “And you probably don’t want to put them under any desks; we don’t want to actually hurt the class.”
Jacob nodded and began walking around, looking for the opportune spots. Julie was supposed to do something similar to what Lily and Alice did, except the spell was to be placed on the doors. Remus followed her over to the doors in the room, performing the timing spell for her. Once she was finished, she pocketed her wand and waited for Andy to do his job, which was to make the blackboard spin around uncontrollably. By the time Andy and Remus finished with the board, Jacob had finished placing the fireworks and all Remus had to do was set them a time to go off.
The seventh years bid Remus goodnight, took the Invisibility Cloak and set off for Gryffindor Tower. Remus disappeared back under the desk, rubbing his tired eyes as he did so. It was almost over, that was his only consolation. He just had to wait for James, Sirius and Peter to do their job and he could go back to the dormitory with them. They had planned this to take as little time as possible. It would look a little odd if ten students were extremely tired on the same day. He gazed around the room, trying to see if anyone was coming, or if Crane had suddenly decided to do an inspection of his room in the early morning hours. Luckily, Crane didn’t seem to be that crazy and Remus was very much alone.
After what seemed like an hour, but was probably only fifteen minutes, Remus heard the signal and knew his friends had arrived. He slid out from under the desk and unlatched the door for them. He warily stuck his head through the doorway and looked down both ends of the corridor. Even in the darkness he would be able to see the outline of a forthcoming figure, but he saw nothing. They were under the cloak. Very faintly he could hear Sirius call his name. Remus responded with the signal and, once the boys entered the room, they set to work.
At the thirtieth second of the fifteen minute of the tenth hour of the nineteenth day of May of 1972 the objects on Professor Crane’s desk began moving up and down and no one knew exactly why. Crane’s quills did back flips, the inkbottles did a number of cartwheels, and the parchment did a jig. The class of Slytherin first years watched, transfixed at the site. They knew that they weren’t doing it, and the professor seemed far too bewildered to be behind it.
Approximately two minutes later, the windows began opening and closing on their own accord, making such a racket that Crane could not make his voice heard. The class jumped when they first heard the noise. What was going on? An invisible force continued to bang the windows around, and once again Crane seemed too shocked to know what was happening. The objects on the desk were still floating in midair, continuing to perform their manoeuvers. The windows kept hammering in such a way that no one could tell if it would stop.
Another two minutes passed before the doors began the same course as the windows. Another minute went by before the blackboard that Crane was attempting to write on began whirling around like a top. Crane fell backwards in shock and scrambled up to his feet, mouthing wordlessly. He went to sit down at his desk, needing a way to steady himself, but the chair promptly moved out of reach of his bottom.
Cursing quite loudly, Crane picked himself up and decided the best thing to do was to seek a haven in his office. There was just one hitch. The entrance to his office (which had moments before been opening and closing uncontrollably) had sealed itself off and would not budge. He needed something… he went to his coffee goblet (which had mercifully not been filled with Dungbombs). When he went to drink it the coffee promptly shot out at his face. Crane’s only luck was that it was not burning hot. He yelled out in frustration and chucked the goblet to the floor.
Another minute passed before the fireworks exploded, filling the room with clouds of colourful smoke and sparks. The explosion was so loud that no one could hear the foul words that issued from Crane’s mouth. No one could hear him screaming that it was true. No one could see him fall prey to the cunning minds of the Gryffindor students. They did hear one thing, however, once he could make his voice heard.
At the sixteenth second of the twenty fifth minute of the tenth hour of the nineteenth day of May of 1972, Professor Crane was announcing his resignation.
The class of Slytherin first years were fortunately kept out of detention and the true culprits were never caught. They made sure to leave no trace of themselves in the room that could give the slightest hint to who they were. They simply sat in gleeful silence as Professor Dumbledore announced that Defence Against the Dark Arts classes would cease for the remainder of the year. Professor Crane had gone running out of the castle the moment he told Dumbledore he quit. The students, despite the fact they knew it was inappropriate, could not contain their cheers. The professors, it seemed, could also not contain their grins of satisfaction. Professor Dumbledore halfheartedly tried to calm his students’ cheers, but in the end he let them stop on their own.
It became common knowledge throughout the Gryffindors, and eventually the rest of the school, who the culprits were. For the remainder of the school year, the first years, Jacob, Julie and Andy were received with pats on the back and congratulations. James and Sirius were taking this in stride; they beamed at the unending accolades. Remus and Peter found it amusing, or at least Peter did. Remus found it somewhat exasperating, but pretended that he didn’t find it annoying. Some people, Lily Evans in particular, found his behaviour grating and, in fact, stopped speaking to James.
Still, the shock of Crane’s departure dissipated slowly, and the cheers and accolades went with it. Now the students had their exams to worry about. The seventh and fifth years were rarely seen outside of their common rooms or the library as they desperately prepared for their N.E.W.T. and O.W.L. examinations. Severe warnings were being given out to anyone who disturbed the peace of the common rooms. The fifth year prefects were not about to let their grades suffer because of noise. The younger students studied restlessly for their end-of-the-year exams. They could be found sitting in the library at unusual hours, even the students who never studied at all (such as James and Sirius) could now be seen cracking open a book or two. Remus and Peter, who had been waiting for this moment all year, could not even spare a moment to gloat about this.
The exams came and went, much to the relief of the students. All that was left was the End-of-the-Year feast and the announcement of which house had won the House Cup. Judging from the amount of stones in the hourglasses, Ravenclaw appeared to be the winner, with Slytherin trailing second. The Great Hall was decked out in blue and bronze banners, embellished with eagles. The students talked loudly and cheerfully as they ate their dinners on the final day of school, discussing what they would be doing over the summer. Professor Dumbledore stood up and silence fell straight away.
“The end of another year,” he said, his eyes gleaming at the happy faces of his students. “An, ah, eventful year at best.” The students sniggered, all knowing what he meant. “I believe that now is the appropriate time to announce the winner of the House Cup this year. In fourth place is Hufflepuff with two hundred and ninety six points. In third place is Gryffindor with three hundred points. Coming in second is Slytherin with four hundred and thirty three points. And the winner of the House Cup for this year is Ravenclaw with four hundred and thirty seven points!”
The Ravenclaw table erupted into raucous applause, celebrating their victory.
The Hogwarts Express chugged through the murky grey countryside; rain was pattering on the windows of the compartments. James, Sirius, Remus and Peter sat in their lantern lit compartment, swapping Chocolate Frog cards and talking about what they planned to do while on holiday.
“My parents are going to take me to France. They love France and always wanted to take me there. We leave on Monday, actually,” James said, taking the Merlin card that Remus was handing him.
“Bloody French,” Sirius muttered, ripping open a package of Drooble’s gum with his teeth.
“What do you have against the French?”
“They have stinky cheese.”
James rolled his eyes. “Anyway, my parents said we’ll only be gone for two weeks and when we get back you guys can spend a week at my house, if you want.” He looked up at his friends expectantly.
“I’ll try,” Sirius said, shrugging. “My parents might not be thrilled about me going to your house, but they might like that it gets rid of me faster.”
James nodded and turned his attention to Remus.
“What week is that?” he asked, looking fairly nervous.
James thought for a moment, recalling the dates his parents had given him. “The week of the 23rd.”
Remus frowned; there was a full moon right in the middle of that week. He shook his head sadly. “I don’t think I can.”
“What?”
“I can’t come that week.”
“Why not?”
“I dunno. My dad said it’s just not going to be a good week for me to go anywhere.”
James looked annoyed, but said nothing else. Instead he said to Peter, “please tell me you can come. I don’t want to be stuck with Sirius all week.”
“I think I can,” Peter replied, grinning. “I just have to check with my parents. I’ll send you an owl when I have an answer.”
They spent the remainder of the ride playing Exploding Snap, which was basically pointless. James, Sirius and Peter knew that their one victory of Remus was not going to be repeated, but they tried anyway. By the time they were finished, Sirius was ready to fling the deck of cards out the window. Remus managed to stop Sirius, as they were his only deck and he was not letting them float about the countryside for all eternity.
The Hogwarts Express pulled up at Platform Nine and Three Quarters and the students began filing into the corridors and out into the overcast day. The four boys dragged their trunks around the platform and Sirius instantly spotted his mother and father standing with a boy who looked very much like a younger Sirius. Sirius led his friends behind a large group of seventh years who were saying goodbye to each other, so as to avoid catching his parents’ eyes.
“Write me, okay?” he said, looking over his shoulder to make sure his family had not seen him. The three boys nodded. “I’ll see you and Peter in two weeks, then,” he said to James. “Maybe we can all meet in Diagon Alley?”
“Yeah, when the booklists come,” Remus said.
“See you, then.” Sirius grasped the handle of his trunk and reluctantly dragged it to his parents and brother.
“Come on,” James said, jerking his thumb towards the platform barrier. “Our parents are out there.” Sure enough, when they emerged on the other side, their parents were standing together, awaiting the arrival of their sons. Once the boys were finished greeting their parents, they turned to each other.
“I’ll see you in two weeks, James,” Peter said.
“Yeah, Pete,” James said, smiling. “Try and come, Remus?”
“I don’t know…” Remus replied, looking at the ground.
“At least write.”
“Of course, I can still do that.”
“Well, see you guys soon then.”
The boys grabbed their trunks and followed their families in separate directions, ready to begin their summer holidays.