Sirius Black was bored.

A common occurrence, no doubt, but a miserable one. He rested his chin on his fist and pretended to pay attention to whatever Professor Onai was saying while watching James attempt to build a castle on Peter's back with tarot cards.

Last night had been a long one. The wolf had been extra energetic which meant the Marauders were exactly the opposite. They were exhausted.

Peter had fallen to sleep, not even fifteen minutes into the Divination class, and was now slumped onto with nearly his entire upper half sprawled out, a thin line of drool escaping his lips to make a puddle on the velvety red tablecloth. James, who looked as bored as Sirius felt, quickly made a game out of it to entertain himself. Not an easy game, however, considering that every time Peter breathed, the entire castle trembled.

Professor Onai was too busy discussing the meaning behind the three of swords card with a girl from their year to pay any attention to James or the other Marauders. After four years of teaching them, one would think she'd know better than to leave them unsupervised, but when it came to Colleen Cassidy, her favorite student, anything else going on was irrelevant. Rumor had it, Colleen was a true Seer, but Sirius had seen no evidence to support this theory and the fact that she was literally blind seemed enough to disprove it.

Sirius turned away from Colleen and the professor. James had managed a fairly solid base; three sets of tepees with a card laid over top to bridge the gaps between them. Sirius was impressed... right up until they fell into each other like dominos and the whole thing went crashing down.

"What was that for?" The bespeckled Gryffindor moped, dropping his hands to gather up the cards.

Sirius shrugged and put on his most innocent expression. "I don't know what you're talking about."

James gave his friend a pointed look, jutting his bottom lip out to expose the salmon pink of his inner lip. Apparently, he wasn't buying the whole mate-I-would-never-blow-down-your-castle act that Sirius was putting on.

"Well, I'm bored," Sirius said as though that excused his actions. He sighed loudly to prove his point, then glanced over his shoulder at Professor Onai. Luckily for him, Colleen still had her distracted. Sirius smirked in the direction of the bright eyed brunette. Colleen was fun to mess with and an easy target for pranks--for whatever reason, she never saw them coming. Some Seer she was.

"Play solitaire or something," James replied with a dismissing wave of the hand. He stacked the deck of cards in a uniform pile and returned them to the table.

"Solitaire!" Sirius exclaimed in indignation. "I'm not that bored! Besides, you can't even play that with tarot cards!"

"How would you know that?" James asked, attempting to balance two cards along Peter's spine. His tongue poked out of the corner of his mouth and his black eyebrows furrowed in concentration. "Have you ever tried?"

Sirius glared at him, but it went unnoticed. Why was James being so boring? This was unacceptable. "I miss Moony," he said. "He wouldn't let me be bored."

"Moony would most definitely let you be bored," James scoffed.

Sirius couldn't deny that. He threw his arms on the table and buried his face in the crook of his elbow, tossing his long hair over his shoulder while exclaiming, "What has the world come to? Both of my best friends are now boring?"

"Hey!" James put a hand to his chest in mock offense. "I, James Fleamont Potter, am, in absolutely nowise, boring!"

Sirius grinned and peeked out of his arms, pleased to have got a rise out of his friend. "Oh yeah? Prove it."

"Oh, you're on, Black," James said, returning the grin. Abandoning the cards, he turned to the blond boy beside him and gave his shoulders a gentle shake. "Pete, wake up."

Peter grumbled something unintelligible and swatted James' hand. James just shook him harder.

"Few more minutes, Mum," he muttered.

James gasped and exclaimed, in mock distress, "Do I look like your mother?"

Sirius snickered.

Finally, Peter lifted his head from his arms and studied his friends with eyes glazed in sleep. His face was even redder than usual and a few indents striped his cheeks from where the seams of his shirt pressed into his skin. "Whadya want?"

"Well, you see, Pete..." Sirius said with a smirk.

"It's been far too long since the Marauders caused mischief," James finished for him. It'd been precisely two hours since they had caused mischief, but with Remus in the hospital wing, there was no one to tell them off. Even then, Remus was the brains behind the best of their pranks.

Peter's bleary eyes lit up. "Oooh, I like where this is going."

The trio leaned over the table and put their heads together, in both senses, to plot the best prank.

"Something scary and superstitious," Sirius said, casting a glance toward a cluster of classmates who were leaning on Professor Onai's every word. He couldn't believe anyone bought into all the divination crap. Predetermined fate was a ridiculous concept, in Sirius' opinion. There was no proof.

James nodded eagerly. "Okay, I can work with this... so everyone pulls the death card or something like that?"

The comment was met with enthusiastic agreement and wide grins.

"But... how would we get them to pick the card we want?" Peter asked.

"Good point." James frowned. He hated those.

"The Imperius curse is always an option," Sirius suggested. He'd seen it work many times before and was sure he could manage it.

"That's illegal!" Peter exclaimed, wide eyed, at the same time as James laughed and said, "Sorry, mate, but absolutely not."

Sirius put his hands up in surrender and leaned back. "Alright, alright, just a suggestion. 'S only really bad when you use it maliciously."

"Depends on your definition of malicious," James said. "Any other ideas, gents? Peter?"

Peter looked down, cheeks pinkening at being called on. He hummed in consideration and said, "We could do some glamour spell? Pam uses them all the time when she's in a rush and doesn't have time to do her makeup."

"That... that could work..." Sirius agreed, nodding slowly. The more he thought about it, the more he liked it. Glamour spells weren't necessarily difficult and they'd do the job--change the appearance of the cards. "How'd we do it, Petey?"

Peter explained the spell as best he could and the boys practiced pronouncing the incantation beneath their breath. Just when Peter was about to test it out, Professor Onai cleared her throat. The tassels on her sandy orange headwrap swung in time with the snake-like braids that had slipped free of the wrap as she strode to the center of the room.

"Listen, listen," she said, placing emphasis on every 'i' to give them a long 'e' sound. "Get into groups of two or t'ree an' practice yo' tarot readings. Exam will be next class!"

"Now!" James said through the side of his mouth.

On his cue, the three boys pointed their wands at the tarot decks and muttered, "videre iniuriam."

"Moment of truth," Sirius whispered to his friends with a grin. They watched as their classmates drew their cards, but instead of the horror they'd expected to see, the other students' faces were simply confused. Incredibly anticlimactic, Sirius thought.

"Did it work?" Peter asked. He reached across the table to their deck and selected the card on top, blinking furiously at it as though there was something in his eyes.

"Well?" Sirius said.

"I-" the blond started, "I don't see anything."

"It didn't work? Lemme see!" James said, ripping the card from Peter's hand. "W- woah."

"What?" Sirius exclaimed.

James rubbed his eyes and looked up at Sirius. His hazel eyes were unfocused, drifting in the right general direction, but not at Sirius. James cussed and mass panic ensued.