"Fred, George, what are you two up to now?" Albert asked, his voice dripping with feigned astonishment as he rounded the corner. He found his roommates crouched low, their backsides pointed toward the ceiling, scrubbing a particularly gruesome patch of the corridor floor.
"Mopping, clearly," Fred replied dryly, not even looking up. He was rubbing a stubborn, foul-smelling stain with a small, saturated rag.
"Honestly, I never realized you two were so dedicated to custodial work," Lee Jordan said, his expression a mask of pure, unadulterated glee. He stood with Albert, arms crossed, relishing the twins' punishment. Dungbombs were notoriously difficult to clean; Filch, of course, hadn't given them any proper magical detergent, forcing them to rely on elbow grease, cold water, and misery.
"This," Filch announced, sidling up to the onlookers, his eyes gleaming with malicious satisfaction, "is what happens when you defile the corridors with filth. Don't think you can get away with doing bad things in this castle."
"Don't worry," Albert said, leaning down to pat the twins' aching shoulders in a show of false comfort. "I'll make sure to ask for leave for you from the Defense Against the Dark Arts class."
"Why do I always feel that you are just gloating?" Fred grumbled, trying to swat Albert's hand away.
"Really?" Albert asked innocently, turning to Lee Jordan. "No, who told them to throw Dungbombs in the corridor and get caught by Filch?"
"I thought they'd be smart enough to throw them when Filch wasn't around," Lee admitted, still shaking his head at their blunder.
Albert, of course, knew the true reason they'd walked right into the caretaker's clutches. If Filch hadn't been standing right there, Albert wouldn't have minded using the Scouring Charm to instantly remove the stench, but under Filch's watchful, gleeful eye, any magic would result in a swift and far worse punishment.
It took Fred and George several agonizing, back-breaking hours to completely remove the evidence from the corridors and Filch's office. They missed lunch and finally trudged to the kitchens to make themselves hurried sandwiches. They sat outside under a quiet tree, exhausted and sore, but their mission had been accomplished.
"Where is it? What did you take? Don't tell me all that pain was for nothing," George demanded, shoving half of a sandwich into his mouth and looking expectantly at Fred.
"Here. Look." Fred reached into his pocket and pulled out the prize: the aged, mysterious envelope. He handed it over.
"What is this?" George frowned, turning the envelope over. It was blank where the sender's address should be, but two curious sentences were written on the front in elegant, faded script: I solemnly swear that I am up to no good, and, slightly smaller, Mischief managed.
"Open it up!"
George quickly tore open the envelope and pulled out a large, square, incredibly old piece of parchment. It was heavy, stiff, and utterly blank.
"A piece of old parchment," George declared flatly, looking at Fred with deep confusion. "We risked detention and forty House points for a blank, dusty piece of paper?"
"It has to be a secret," Fred argued, unwilling to accept defeat. "Why else would it be in the 'Highly Dangerous' drawer? Wait, the envelope! There must be a password!"
"The two lines!" George realized, pulling out his wand and pointing it at the blank page. He remembered the feeling of Fred's successful Alohomora and focused intensely. "I solemnly swear that I am up to no good."
Ink lines, fine and black as spider silk, immediately began to appear where the wand had touched. They merged, crisscrossed, and rapidly spread to every corner of the parchment, forming an intricate, detailed diagram.
"We need a password!" the twins cried out in astonished unison, the tiredness instantly gone, replaced by unconcealable excitement.
A moment later, a line of elegant, swirling text appeared at the top of the parchment:
Messrs. Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot, and Prongs proudly present The Marauder's Map.
"The Marauder's Map?" the twins read, their voices hushed with reverence. "This old parchment is actually a map!"
"George, look! The tiny ink dots on the parchment are moving!" Fred exclaimed, pointing a trembling finger at the minuscule labels that were moving slowly along the map's lines.
"Nonsense, why else would it be called the Marauder's Map?" George scoffed, though his voice was choked with amazement.
The two of them immediately bent their heads together, studying their incredible find. They quickly discovered that the map showed the specific, detailed layout of Hogwarts Castle, including seven distinct, marked secret passages that even they had never heard of, along with the passwords needed to open them. Finally, they wouldn't have to worry about finding a secret passage only to be blocked by a silent wall!
But the most amazing feature was the tracking: the map accurately marked the location of every single person in the castle with an ink dot labeled by name.
Albert was currently moving out of the library and heading toward the Gryffindor common room. Filch, labeled in his usual grumpy scrawl, was pacing the Fourth Floor. Peeves the mischievous ghost was causing trouble on the Sixth Floor.
"George..." Fred began, staring at the map.
"Fred..." George replied, equally mesmerized.
"You talk first..." they started simultaneously, before dissolving into a bout of uncontrollable, relieved laughter.
"Then let's talk together," Fred proposed.
"Night tours!" they whispered in unison, their eyes shining with future mischief.
"From now on, when we go out at night, we don't have to worry about being caught by Filch even without the Disillusionment Charm," Fred crowed.
"This is amazing! There are still so many secret passages we haven't discovered yet!" George agreed.
"Try the other password," Fred urged, holding his wand against the map again and whispering, "Mischief managed."
The next moment, the intricate lines and moving ink dots on the parchment gradually began to disappear. Within a few seconds, it turned back into the blank, old parchment they had found.
"The traces have been erased!" George whispered in surprise. "The creators really thought of everything! A magical deterrent against prying eyes."
"It makes sense," Fred mused. "If everyone knew about this, it would be all over the castle in an hour. This must be a defense mechanism to prevent others from seeing the secret."
"Tell me, did Filch ever figure out how to use this parchment?" George wondered aloud. "He knows the locations of so many secret passages better than any other student. Why didn't he use the map himself to catch us? Why keep it locked in a drawer instead of carrying it with him?"
"I don't know, and I don't care," Fred replied, shaking his head. "The Marauder's Map belongs to us now. Should we tell anyone?" He was referring, of course, to Albert and Lee Jordan.
"For now," George decided, "no. The fewer people who know, the safer it is."
"But Albert knows we took something highly dangerous from Filch's drawer," Fred pointed out. "He'll know we succeeded."
"But if we don't tell him what it is, he can only guess," George countered, a secretive grin spreading across his face.
The prospect of endless, unmonitored mischief was too tempting. "Don't think too much about it. Let's go and check out the nearest secret passage right now!" The twins stood up, sore but energized, and walked off arm-in-arm, the blank parchment folded safely between them.
"Who do you think the creators of this Marauder's Map were: Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot, and Prongs?" George asked as they hurried along a quiet passage.
"They must have been students of Hogwarts—and absolutely brilliant ones," Fred replied, then spotted a suit of armor. Checking the map quickly, he touched the armor's helmet, which slid aside to reveal a dark opening. "Hurry up! Someone's coming this way!"
The two scrambled into the dark passage just as a ghost floated past. The armor returned to its original position.
"Where does this secret passage lead?" George whispered, pulling out his wand and trying to light it. The small light sputtered and went out.
"It goes to the Fifth Floor," Fred said, navigating by the light of the map. He couldn't help but complain, "You still haven't mastered the Lumos Charm!"
"You say that as if you've mastered it!" George retorted, feeling his way along the cold, damp stone wall.
They were in. They had the ultimate tool. Their careers as top-tier pranksters had just begun.
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Do you think the "Marauders"—Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot, and Prongs—were Gryffindors or members of another house, given their focus on secret passages and mischief?