Eight o'clock in the evening.
Douglas glanced at the time and stood up, turning to the Weasley twins.
"How's your memorization going? How much longer until you can write it out from memory?"
George and Fred's eyes lit up—was the Professor about to leave?
If they claimed it would take longer, maybe they could finish detention early tonight.
"Professor, we probably need another half hour to really get it down!"
"And writing it out will take at least an hour!"
Douglas just gave a noncommittal "Oh," then promptly ushered them to the doorway.
"Stand out here and keep reciting. When you're ready, write it out."
Ever since the two had swaggered into his office with Angelina for snacks and tea, Douglas no longer trusted them alone in his office.
The Weasley brothers just shrugged. At this point, standing in the corridor to memorize and write was nothing to them.
After last time, to avoid being thrown outside again, they always came bundled up in thick clothes—and tonight, they finally had a little gadget ready to use.
Douglas walked out with them, took a few steps down the corridor, then doubled back.
He pulled a piece of parchment from his pocket and said sternly,
"You two stay right here. No wandering. Don't forget, I have the Marauder's Map!
Oh, and if you finish writing, you don't have to wait for me—head back to Gryffindor Tower on your own. Once I see you on the map, I'll catch up with you.
And one more thing—don't even think about cheating.
You should know there's a kind of magic that can recall everything that happened over the past few hours..."
With that, he strode off. As for that "memory-recall" magic—well, in the wizarding world, who could say they'd heard of every spell? Making up a couple to keep students in line was always fair game.
There was, of course, Prior Incantato, but that only replayed spells cast by a wand...
George and Fred watched Douglas's retreating back.
"Is there really a spell like that?"
"I vaguely remember Prior Incantato, but I'm not sure how it works..."
"Well, George, you're a real scholar! So, should we take out the thing or not?"
"Fred, the Professor only said we had to come out here—he never said we had to stand..."
"The Marauder's Map can't tell if we're standing or sitting..."
They grinned and high-fived in celebration.
Just then, Douglas, still on the stairs, called back down,
"What are you two up to?
Isn't memorizing supposed to make some noise?"
The twins jumped, quickly grabbed their textbooks, and began to recite at top volume.
Once Douglas was gone, they each pulled a thick wooden rod from their belts.
With a flick of their wands, the rods split into three-legged folding stools, the seats fashioned from an old bedsheet borrowed from a roommate.
They'd tested them—unless you bounced around, they were perfectly stable.
The design was inspired by a folding stool they'd once seen at Douglas's Muggle home, adapted for better concealment and convenience.
Originally, they'd wanted to invent a fake wand that could cast a simple fire-making charm, then transform into a stool for sitting by the fire.
Unfortunately, they'd never found the time...
On his patrol, Douglas encountered Mrs. Norris making her rounds alone.
He pulled a small dried fish from his pocket and offered it to her.
She took it, rubbed against his trouser leg, and slinked away.
If the students of Hogwarts could have seen it, they'd have been dumbfounded.
The infamous Mrs. Norris, always on the lookout for misbehaving students, actually acting affectionate toward someone!
Douglas strolled leisurely through the castle, shooing any students he came across back toward their common rooms.
When he reached a certain corridor, he looked around—empty.
He pulled out the Marauder's Map, drew his wand, and tapped it lightly:
"I solemnly swear that I am up to no good!"
As he watched the shifting ink dots, he muttered under his breath,
"I'm not lying to you.
Of course, from the students' perspective, what I'm doing definitely isn't 'good'!
But as a professor, I have to do what professors ought to do!"
He checked the bathroom he'd been keeping an eye on—nothing unusual.
The twins were still at his office door.
Filch was patrolling the dungeons.
Soon, he spotted his next targets.
"Heh, Gryffindor and Ravenclaw, is it? Tsk, tough luck!"
He didn't even need the map anymore—Douglas made his way straight to the door of the abandoned classroom.
He coughed twice, loudly, to give the pair inside a warning.
Then he pushed open the door and, with a flick of his wand, lit the long-extinguished candles.
In the flickering candlelight, a boy and a girl—faces flushed bright red.
Douglas let out a subtle sigh of relief. Thank Merlin nothing truly inappropriate had happened.
He recognized them: the girl was a sixth-year Gryffindor, the boy a fifth-year Ravenclaw.
"Out after hours without a professor's note.
Gryffindor and Ravenclaw, twenty points each, gone.
I'll let Professors McGonagall and Flitwick know about your detentions.
Well?
Don't just stand there—off to your common rooms!"
Watching them bolt in panic, Douglas couldn't help but sigh.
Back when he'd been a student, there'd been a scandal involving a secret rendezvous—
A seventh-year boy had gotten a sixth-year girl pregnant, just two months shy of her seventeenth birthday.
Wizard pregnancies weren't easy, so even though Hogwarts hadn't expelled them,
the girl took a leave of absence to have the child and never returned to finish her studies...
The fallout was a massive expansion of Hogwarts' night patrols, and for a long time, every corner was thoroughly checked.
It had even led to Douglas, Bill, and Charlie once being cornered by two professors during a midnight adventure in an abandoned classroom.
They'd all been given lengthy detentions.
From then on, whenever the three had time, they'd go night-wandering—
Not for mischief, but, as they liked to say, to "guard the purity of Hogwarts!"
With the Marauder's Map, they'd hunt down doomed lovebirds—two would block the doors, while the third quietly fetched Filch...
Soon, rumors spread among the students: somewhere in Hogwarts, there was a thousand-year-old single ghost, forever seeking revenge on couples.
Of course, the real Hogwarts ghosts always denied the story.
In truth, Douglas had long suspected that he and his friends had been secretly cursed by those couples they'd reported.
He'd overheard even the most upright Hufflepuff prefects whispering in their common room about how to curse a ghost...
Despite the flood of love letters they'd received, the three of them had graduated—still single. Painfully, purely single.
Of course, tonight's patrol wasn't just about "guarding Hogwarts' purity."
More importantly, it was all part of his grand plan: to make morning exercise an official Hogwarts class.
As an ordinary professor, he couldn't simply order students to get up early for morning runs.
But he could gradually build his team—one detention at a time.
Thank Merlin for Hogwarts' trust in its professors, allowing them to set their own detention assignments...
Just as he was about to hunt down a second pair,
he suddenly noticed a single ink dot moving toward the Forbidden Forest.
He recognized the name—a third-year Hufflepuff.
Douglas's brow furrowed. This late at night, heading for the Forbidden Forest, and a Hufflepuff at that...
He watched the dot's path and, seeing it wasn't headed toward Hagrid's hut, finally relaxed a little.
These days, Douglas often looped by Hagrid's place during his morning runs, checking on the chickens.
Hagrid had noticed Douglas circling his hut every morning.
Though Douglas never interrupted his nap, it still felt odd to be watched by a main subject professor while he slept.
When he noticed Douglas always sneaking glances at his chickens,
he assumed Douglas wanted to make beggar's chicken again but was too embarrassed to ask.
So Hagrid generously offered to give him three or four chickens for the dish.
Douglas politely refused.
Three or four chickens? What, you think one isn't enough for me? Even honest Hagrid is getting clever about food these days...
Back to the present!
Watching that ink dot about to disappear at the edge of the Marauder's Map,
Douglas sprinted for an open-air corridor.
With a burst of speed, he planted his left foot on the castle wall, swung his right foot out into empty air,
and unleashed the long-lost technique: left-foot-boosts-right-foot-takeoff!
Above the Hogwarts castle,
a crane's cry—absent for three years—echoed through the night.
~~~❃❃~~~~~~~~❃❃~~~
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