"Jack thinks Professor Pitch Black is doing something fishy in his personal lab."

Rapunzel blinked at him in confusion, "But Professor Black is the Potion Master…isn't experimenting, you know, part of the job?" Hiccup was about to say something when he looked up to see his two dangling friends were starting to get uncomfortably red in the face. He smirked inwardly, hopefully this'll teach them…although he won't put too much stock in it. They can be incurably obstinate when they want to be.

"How bout' we let them down first?"

"Are you sure? They might jump us."

Having heard them, the dangling pair oddly synchronized in giving the other pair a very rude hand gesture, thankfully Hiccup was feeling rather generous today.

"Drop em', Punz."

So they fell, face first with a pained grunt (Hiccup removed the silencing spell as they fall). Merida and Jack lay still for a few seconds, then once again they oddly synchronized in their twitching (Hiccup wondered if he should tell them that…nah, it's not worth the annoyance.)

"Are they still alive, Hic?" Rapunzel, knelt beside Merida and gingerly poked the princess on the side. "Mer, are you still alive?"

To make the story short, retribution was extracted and served.

They settled back down on the blanketed floor. Merida lay on her stomach with one arm propping her chin while her free hand played with Rapunzel's loose hair, Rapunzel sat beside her languidly brushing the end of her very long and very thick hair. While Jack had his back against a transfigured couch and his legs draped across Hiccup's lap, Hiccup himself sat cross-legged with a very annoyed expression at the limbs that weren't his own and at the owner of said limbs. He sighed, running his hand through his now slightly cold and damp hair, combing and scraping out the frost in his hair, wincing at his throbbing left eye where Merida had decked him one.

It was an unspoken rule among them that Rapunzel is off limits no matter what, which of course meant that Hiccup was fair game.

"So let me get this straight…yer saw Pitch acting all funny one day and decide that he must be doing something nefarious, is that it, Frostbite?"

"I didn't imagine it! He really was acting all weird…well, weirder than normal! He was sneaking around! Sneaking! And in the dungeons no less! I mean, who'd sneak around in his own turf if they weren't hiding something, right Hikke?!"

"Don't ask me, he's not my Head of House and get off!" He shoved the legs off his lap, ignoring the pout Jack was giving him.

"Ye' sure ye didn't hit yer noggin one too many time, Frostbite?" Merida smirked.

Jack opened his mouth to retort something scathing back but Hiccup was faster and slapped his hand over the other's mouth. "Can it, Jack! I have a one brawl per day limit and I think I filled that quota today, thank you very much! That goes for you too, Mer. Stop baiting him already."

"Not mah' fault, Hic."

"Okay, guys! Back to Professor Black, remember? Let's say that Jack was right and he is up to something suspicious, what are we supposed to do about it?" Rapunzel asked, earning a look of gratitude from Hiccup for changing the topic.

Jack grabbed at Hiccup's hand over his mouth and pushed it down. "We look for evidence and bust his pasty-grey ass, of course!"

"No, we are not. In fact, we are just going to pretend this conversation never happened."

"Hikke! C'mon! Where's your sense of adventure?!" Jack sprang up to grab the Hufflepuff by the shoulders, yanking him closer till their heads almost smashed against each other.

"Left it at home coz' it got stuck in the door." Hiccup said simply and shoved one hand into Jack's face to push him away, "And you are way too close, Sir! Please refrain yourself."

Merida sighed as she watched the boys started to fool around (well, it was really just Jack but Hiccup tend to give back as good as he gets although he would forever deny it), she then thought back on what Jack said earlier. Rapunzel gave up trying to get their attention and noticed the thoughtful look on Merida's face.

"Mer?" "Hm?"

"What are you thinking?" The blonde dropped her book and brush to lie on her stomach next to the redhead, propping herself with her elbows and forearms.

"Ye' know…maybe Jack's right."

Hearing his name being said, Jack paused in giving Hiccup the 'punisher lock' as he called it (it was just a headlock, really) and turned to the two girls.

"I am?"

"He is?"

Annoyed at the skeptic in Hiccup's tone, Jack hooked his arm around the thin boy's neck in a chokehold. "What was that, Hikke? Was that 'Jack is so awesome that of course he's right' I hear?"

"Then you need to clean out your ears, the wax build up can make you deaf to all reasons." Hiccup elbowed the white hair Slytherin in the middle, earning a grunt from said Slytherin.

"Ah' got it!" Merida exclaimed, startling Rapunzel beside her and the boys stopped to stare at her. She pushed herself up to her feet and started pacing, curly red hair swishing about her face with the movement. "Hogsmeade!"

"What? Hogsmeade?" Jack raised a questioning brow at her.

"Punzie, ye' were there too! Remember?"

The blonde furrowed her brows trying to recall and slowly nodded. "I think so…we were at Three Broomsticks, right?"

"Yup, we were just comin' out when we saw im'."

Hiccup and Jack looked at each other in confusion before turning back to the girls. "Uh…Punz? Mer? What are you girls talking about?" Hiccup asked, having finally shoved Jack away.

"Last weekend, Hogsmeade trip, Punzie and Ah' saw Pitch there!"

"At Hogsmeade? And pray tell, girls, just what was he doin' there? Having tea at Pudifoot's?" Jack snickered and got a pillow to his face courtesy of Merida.

"Fer yer's information, Frostbite, we saw im' headin' into Hogshead." She glared at him.

"That's nothing new, Mer. All the creepy characters go to Hogshead on the weekends; it's like an exclusive club for the Mean, Dark and Nasty."

"Not to mention The Pervs and Pedos Alliance." The boys guffawed at their own jokes, much to Merida's annoyance.

"E' wasn't alone." They stopped laughing. "What?" Jack blinked up to her.

"Ah' was curious and followed im' there, e' was meeting someone inside the pub."

"Who?"

She shook her head, "No idea, whoever it was had their hood up and Ah' wasn't about to hang around tha' place."

Jack sat up straight and cross-legged on the floor, blue eyes narrowed. "Hmm…not only was he acting suspicious, but looks like he has an accomplice!"

"Hold on, Jack! You don't know that, what if he was only meeting up with a friend or an acquaintance…you know, like normal people?"

"Hikke! This is Pitch we're talking about! There's nothing 'Normal' about Pitch, saying that he's normal is like saying you love violence, pain and dancing naked in the rain when we all know how big a puss you are…hey, that rhymed somehow."

Hiccup was not amused, "That still doesn't prove anything."

"And that's why we're gonna find proof! I'm telling you! Pitch's up to no good!"

"Then go and tell the other professors! I'm sure they're more than capable of handling Pitch if he is up to something."

"Where's the fun in that?" Hiccup rolled his eyes at the other; he should've known that Jack was more concerned about amusing himself than actually worry about anything, much less about the school in general.

"If we're going to bust Pitch, how do ye' propose we do that?"

"Ooh! This is going to be so exciting!"

"Whoa! Wait! You girls are going with his crackpot plans?!" The brunette couldn't believe what he was hearing. "Hey!" Jack looked indignant but was ignored by the Hufflepuff.

"Why not? Besides, we're not going to do anything bad." Merida said confidently to which Hiccup raised a skeptical brow at her. "Well, nothing 'too' bad, at least; whut's the matter, Hic? Yer can't be scared of ol' Pitch, right?" She challenged, smirking at him.

"Fine, if you guys insists on this Mad Hatter's Tea party, count me out."

The next day.

Hiccup wanted to curse something or rather someone…no, make that three someones, a good old Bat Bogey curse to the face, followed with the barely legal jinxes that really weren't at all legal and should be banned from any respectable school libraries. He groaned pitifully to himself, why…why, oh, why did he have to be such a pushover?

"Shh!" "Quiet!" "Keep it down, Hikke!"

Three set of hands clamped around his mouth, dragging him down to hide behind a nearby suit of armor…which wasn't a good hiding place for four teenagers to begin with. Especially when trying to hide from overly aware potion masters who had a knack for hiding in shadows and ambushing unsuspecting victims.

They've decided to stalk and observe the man, hoping to catch him in the act. They took turns in pairs since there hardly any class where all four houses had to take together. So far the man had been doing absolutely nothing out of the ordinary, catching random students unaware and heaping detentions upon detentions on them, evilly slashing out reasonably good grades and downgrading them, and generally being his creepy self.

Nothing out of the ordinary at all.

Once the man disappears around the corner and down towards the dungeon, Hiccup decided he had enough and slapped the multiple hands away from his face.

"This is stupid! We're gonna get caught for sure!" He hissed in frustration.

"Not if we do this right!" Jack hissed back.

"Ye' can't back out now, Hic!"

"Hey, you guys! We're going to lose him if we dawdle here!"

Merida, Rapunzel and Jack quickly moved to follow while Hiccup stubbornly sat where he was and wanting nothing more than to bash his head against the wall before Jack grabbed him by the back of his robe, dragging him along.

They stalked down the stairs leading to the dungeons, only to realize that Pitch was nowhere to be found.

"Dratted! We lost im'!" Merida cursed, stomping her foot a bit. "This is all yer fault, Hic!"

Hiccup gaped at her, "What?! How is this my fault?"

Before they could argue a deep cold voice sounded from behind them.

"Good evening, children," All four teenagers froze as the shadow behind them suddenly began to take shape, eerie yellow eyes staring back at them, "Can I help you with something?"

Continue?

Hoo boy, they should've listened to Hiccup more often, don't you guys think so? Anyway, here's to hoping that it doesn't suck too much