A/N: What can I say? I just love the Princes James the Dork and Sirius the Needy. I cannot write these two enough. If you like the fic (or don't), leave a review :) Always appreciated.

The system is originally from the television series "It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia" in which the character Dennis has his own pick-up system. Check it out, it's awesome. But read this first.

English is not my first language.

ALSO! If you're interested, this story has been translated to Spanish (El sistema POTTER a prueba de tontos) by Yonofuii, before the addings. Check it out and leave them a review: s/8662864/1/El-sistema-POTTER-a-prueba-de-tontos

REWRITTEN.

Disclaimer: Do not own anything. (Except my shoes.)
Beta: Do not own.

After one downright ridiculous Monday, Sirius Black had had enough. Rather feverishly he pulled his hair while grunting, "You sit right there on the bed."

The boy, who he was talking to, obeyed him wearily, and as soon as he had descended his very arse on the mattress, Black opened his mouth again.

"Okay, so you are..." Sirius paced on the dormitory rug and gestured towards the other boy, who was sitting silently on the bed, frowning slightly at him. "What I kind of mean is... I know you very well, and bloody hell, you might find this either very funny or totally disgusting, but bear with me, will you, please."

He glanced quickly to the other boy's eyes, mustered up a massive amount of courage – which, to be quite honest, wasn't that much – and almost shrieked, "You see the thing is, Remus, I love you!"

The boy on the bed burst out laughing immediately after that, and almost falling off, he snorted, "Oh my sweet Merlin! You've got to be kidding me!"

"Stop laughing at me, Potter!" Black shouted indignantly, crossing his arms on his chest.

Potter now hollered, "Have you gone completely soft in your head? You can't say it like that! He'll freak out of his pants!"

"That's the plan, you dork!"

James adjusted his sweaty glasses on his nose, and sighed. "Sure, but he's old-fashioned. Sorry... try antediluvian. Prehistoric."

"What?"

"Nothing, forget it."

If someone was to ask, James would say that playing Remus Lupin wasn't fun at all, not when a certain maniac was trying to come up with a good way to declare his undying love for the bloke. James shook his head. Knowing that Sirius had some major toning down problems when he tried to express his positive feelings towards basically anything (like the other day when he had told McGonagall he positively loved her), James had decided to be a good mate, and help out the poor sod. Of course he now regretted the whole thing.

During the entire day of Monday they had done this exact thing in their spare time; Sirius had been trying out different approaches, making James do nothing except shake his head continuously as if to tell Sirius that he was an absolute idiot (it had worked rather well the first few times) and by the time it was 6pm, both of them were bushed; tired of trying to come up with good excuses to get the others to not come with them, because, you know, Remus duh, and... James, personally? He was rather tired of Sirius being a total daft.

Who wouldn't be?

Also it should be mentioned that at times Black also had almost forgotten that it was actually James in front of him, and not Remus.

Thankfully Potter had brilliantly quick reflexes, therefore he had been able to flee the danger zone every time Sirius had started to look like he was about to jump his bones. Ugh, the horror.

Sirius snorted at something, and slumped on James' bed. As he rested there on his back, he asked, "Then what do you suggest, oh great master of love confessions?"

The master smiled sadly at him. "My good man, from today I gather that you're totally lost at what to do. That is why I'm going to represent you with something..." James closed his eyes theatrically. "Something you'll appreciate very much, indeed. You must realise that I couldn't have showed this to you earlier because it is so brilliant you might have been blinded, but since you are absolutely lousy at this, I'm afraid I have no other choices than to jeopardise you sight for..." He squinted. "Hanky-panky."

Black grimaced as he rubbed his face. "Are we talking about those nude pictures of you? The ones which you used to persuade Evans to go out with you during Potions class the other day? Because I really don't appreciate seeing those again..." He pulled a face. "Like ever. I mean, what's going on with your tits, man?"

"From now on, since you are a total twat, those pictures are for Lily's eyes only," Potter said and walked to his trunk. He opened it and started to rummage through it.

"How did that work out by the way?" Black grinned evilly at the ceiling of James' bed, and feigned to think. "Oh, I remember! She hit you with a court shoe, am I right?"

Potter felt a slight blush of anger creeping on his cheeks, but instead of showing it to Sirius, he hid it in the trunk. "Yes she did as a matter of fact, but I believe that was only because her maternal instinct told her to give some sort of clothing to a bum naked man."

"You were only naked in the picture, James, and she didn't give you the shoe, she smacked your forehead with it."

James nodded as he opened a thick book. "Yes she did."

"Your point being?"

Searching between the pages but not finding anything, Potter said, "She acknowledged me."

Sirius laughed at that. "Well, I've noticed her acknowledge the flobberworms also, but that doesn't mean she's ever willing to go out with one."

Taking another book from the trunk, James winced at it; a spider crawled out between the pages, and not thinking about it for a second, he threw the book into a wall. He shuddered tremendously, turning back to his friend. "You're a real bastard, did you know that?"

"Yes, my mother never forgot to mention it."

His head again in the trunk, James' voice was muffled to the extent Sirius was barely able to understand him. "So... you're a bastard, afraid of my sexy naked pictures, and utterly unaware of how you're going to make Moony to acknowledge you, yeah? Aren't you the whole package."

"Right", Black agreed from the bed, ignoring James' last remark. "Except of those pictures, you're not sexy in them."

"Nonsense," James muttered blearily, and surfaced from the trunk with a smile. "But don't be afraid, I know exactly how we'll roll."

Not even turning to look, Sirius mumbled, "Yeah, I'm not rolling anywhere, that's Pete's job. He's the tubby one."

"What I meant was," Potter groaned in a manly way, as he again took a book from his trunk. Of course they all were there – as if he needed them. He browsed through the pages. "At first we're going to make Moony notice you, and then take a proper fancy in you. Otherwise he won't take you seriously when you tell him you love him." James smirked at the book, stood up, and took in the sight of Sirius. "And we both know just how seriously he takes you now. It's ridiculous, really; the way you think he does when he's actually all but laughing at you."

"Shouldn't you be quiet?"

Finally James had found what he was looking for; he stooped over his trunk, shoving everything he had thrown on the floor back in it, closed it and trudged to his friend, gripping a piece of parchment in his fist. "It's not me who should be quiet. That's your job, for I am now telling you how exactly you are going to get him to like you."

Sirius merely stared at him. But as if that had stopped James before.

He nodded in a knowing manner. "You'll follow a few basic rules and soon he'll be liquid wax between your fingers, or... whatever makes you happy."

For that Sirius suddenly leered like a lewd idiot. "I do like the sound of that, all right. Okay, I'm in."

"Of course you are, because you are a raging pervert." Potter sat next to his friend and gave him a piece of parchment.

Sirius stared at the rumpled, folded paper in his hand. "Am I going to write him a love letter? You know I don't like writing. The information travels way too fast from my brain to my hand for me to keep up with."

"You idiot, open it," James groaned. He watched as Sirius did just that, and pushed his glasses up on his nose."On that particular paper I have scribbled down the P.O.T.T.E.R. system, and I'm ready to share it with you. Please don't tell anyone about it."

"The what now?" Sirius asked as he tried to make a sense out of James' horrible handwriting. "What... What exactly is this?"

"This, my dearest friend," James stated, tapping the paper with his finger. "This is my self-made system; in other words it is a list of foolproof instructions to make anyone within your dating field to fall hopelessly in love with you." As Sirius showed no signs of life, James nudged him in the side. "Did I say it's foolproof? It means even you can use it. It's absolutely faultless."

"Within my dating field?" Black huffed and shoved the paper back to his friend. He all but glared James. "Yeah, brilliant. It's not going to work on Remus, then."

James was baffled. "What do you mean?"

"He's not within my dating field, James," Sirius quoted and sneered, after which he proceeded to rub his face until he resembled a boiled lobster. "That's the main problem here. As you just said yourself, he's never going to take me seriously enough so I can somehow tell my feelings, because... if you haven't noticed, I've been kind of a lecher. With birds, yeah?" Suddenly he frowned. "Not that if I had him I would have done that, I just... I mean –" He turned his eyes on James and pouted. "In your words... he's never going to acknowledge my existence as anything more than just his... caring mate, or whatever. So... I don't like to play your plan down or anything, but it's never going to work."

Potter made quick notes. "Right. First of all, Sirius, you're not a caring mate, you're a twit led by his cock. Secondly, we must get rid of that ludicrous insecurity of yours. It's disgraceful to your own kind. Thirdly, thank Merlin my plan is going to fix all this."

"Are you seriously calling me insecure?" Sirius snorted. "Me? Insecure?"

James eyed the parchment. "Yes, you. Although you try to act otherwise, actually you are as self-confident as the potato sack under Pete's bed."

"You're the potato sack under Pete's bed," Black retorted intelligently.

"Witty."

"Fine." Sirius made a face at his profile. "Then tell me what to do, Mr. Confidence."

"Well, as you know, the first thing towards recovery is to admit you've got a problem," James croaked while he took his glasses off. He swept them on his robe sleeve, grinning at Sirius. "And you already did that, kind of. Good job!" He gave Sirius thumbs up, and put the glasses back on his nose. "Now, read the first point on the paper."

He shoved the parchment back to Sirius, who blinked at it. "Yeah, you see I would, could I make anything out of this horrid handwriting of yours", Sirius grunted, but tried nevertheless. He moved the paper closer to his nose, squinting at it. "It says... purc... purgatory? What?" His eyes were on James immediately. "So I'm going to go to purgatory for him? What should I pack? Trunks?"

James moved closer to him and assisted. "Yeah, no. You're not going anywhere. The word's... er." He narrowed his eyes, leaning closer to the paper Sirius had in his hands. "Yeah, that's 'panegyric'. Probably." Sirius just stared at the paper as Potter continued explaining, now sitting straight again. "As you can see, each of the letters of the name Potter makes a step. Yeah? Once you follow these steps, you will win the heart which you yearn for. That's the P.O.T.T.E.R. system. Isn't it brilliant? The 'P' here stands for 'panegyric'."

Sirius cocked a brow at him. "Be honest. Did you make that word up?"

"It's a word for a speech which is about good qualities and such," James told him as he read the paper in Sirius' hands. "I think."

"Where on bloody Earth did you find such a word?"

"I'm brilliant, so I found it in my spine."

Pursing his lips, Sirius nodded. "Sure, so... You borrowed one of Remus' books?" Potter nodded sadly at him as if he had been defeated in a great battle, and Sirius resumed examining the paper. "So, are you saying that I have to tell him how adorable, good-looking and savvy I am? Because... I believe he already knows that."

James shrugged nonchalantly as he turned his eyes off the parchment. He rubbed his nose. "Yeah, well... it's effective only if the said things are true."

"Prat," Sirius mumbled and studied the paper. Something dawned on him. "So is this program, or whatever it is, the reason you keep telling Evans how capital you think you are?"

"Yes," Potter said solemnly and fell on his back on the bed. To the bed ceiling he resumed, "But somehow I'm not able to get to the second letter. I'm stuck in the first one."

Black tried to suppress a grin. "This is your system and you're failing at it? Good going, Potter."

"Like I said," James muttered while rubbing his eyes behind the glasses. "Somehow I just can't get pass the first step. She always walks away, making me unable to finish."

"I wonder why," Sirius sniggered at the paper.

While Sirius tried to read the paper, James was drowning on his Lily-thoughts. Obviously.

Once he noticed James had started to drool his own mattress, Sirius groaned and poked the boy's thigh with his bony index finger. "Earth to Potter? I can't read this by myself, you know. Your handwriting keeps getting worse and worse... Were you running from an ogre when you wrote this?" He shook his head. "Horrible, just horrible. Please tell me what this next step is."

Potter returned from Lilyland by slowly sitting up. He blinked heavily, trying to get the dizzying feeling to go away – was he dizzy because of movement he had just made, or because of the thoughts he had had of Lily? Who knew – and he took the paper from Sirius, peering at it. "Now, this 'O' here stands for... 'occasional flattery'? Yeah, that's it, I think." He tilted his head slightly at the parchment. "And I don't understand what you're whinging about. It's not that bad, I can read it just fine."

"'Occasional flattery'?" Sirius repeated as if he hadn't heard correctly. He crossed his arms. "Big words for such a little man..." He quickly moved into James' sight, and slammed his hand on his shoulder. "Hey... does that mean I get to flatter him and tell him how perfect his –"

The Gogglehead interrupted him by saying, "Only a couple of times."

Now Black looked like he really hadn't heard what James had said. "What? Per an hour that is?"

James shook his head vigorously while he tried to figure out his own handwriting. "No, only a couple of times altogether."

"No way." Black couldn't believe his mouldy ears. They undoubtedly were very mouldy since he kept hearing James wrong. "Seriously? Why can't I flatter him more often than that?"

"The rules forbid you, dummy," James sneered, ogling seriously at the text. "You don't want to overdo it. And, admit it, you have kind of a problem with overdoing everything."

"Stupid rules!" Sirius huffed and stood up. He took a few long strides to the next bed – his own, by the way – and sat down on it. He threw his hands in the air. "They should be burnt! What great idiot invented them anyway?"

"I did."

"Should've known. Okay, keep going," Black mumbled as he leaned his back against his own mattress. "The third step?"

James readjusted his glasses on his pointy nose, and squinted at the horrendous letters. They were pretty bad. "It says..."

"Oh, come on man, you can't read your own writing!" Sirius teased and streched his arms above him. He moved them as if he was doing butterfly strokes in a pool. "Did you write that thing with your foot?"

Potter brought the paper closer to his eyes. "Nah, I tried, but the quill kept slipping."

Sirius now drummed his stomach with his fingers. Someone might have noted that he seemed very restless, but Sirius would have told them stupid commenters that he was never restless. He was always very composed and tranquil. Obviously that was the reason why he moved his hands to pull his hair whilst his feet popped up and down in the air like those of a little boy. "I just can't believe you can't remember your own system without reading it from a paper."

"I have plenty of other things going on in my head, thank you very much."

"That's rich," Black laughed, and rolled on his stomach. Between the open curtains of his own bed he saw Remus'. He squinted at the sight.

"Okay, the first 'T' here stands for 'tell something unique'." James waited for his brain to agree. "Yeah, sounds about right." He glanced at his friend, who was now sitting on his legs, head completely turned towards Remus' bed. Although Sirius' shoulders looked like he wasn't listening to him at all, James continued, "So basically you should tell Moony something only you can tell him."

Sirius moved to sit on the edge of his bed, contemplating James' words like the serious man he was. His toes wiggled in the direction of bed next to his. "What should I tell him, then? Like... how incredibly sexy he is?" He tilted his head slightly as though he was contemplating something. "Everyone knows that."

"Eh." James shivered politely, and noted Sirius' back, "The most important point is that you shouldn't tell anyone else what you're going to say to him."

"Naturally," the dog muttered, slowly rising from his bed. He moved briskly – yes, that's exactly the right word, for when Sirius was moving towards Remus or anything that had something to do with the bloke, Sirius was always brisk – at the bed on his right, quickly drawing the curtains open and snatching one pillow from under the duvet. With that, he jumped on his own bed again.

A moment passed during which James was silently trying to figure out the fourth word, and Sirius, being so mindbogglingly interested in his best mate's current activity, pretended to be snogging Remus on his bed.

"Aha! The second 'T' is for 'tacit declaration'," James finally cawed. He turned his eyes on his mate. "I know, I know, it sounds stupid, but if I remember correctly, it means you should let him know about your feelings without actually saying anything. Got it? Sirius?"

Nothing.

"Sirius?"

A grumble replied under the pillow, "Remus."

"You know, I'm getting pretty good at reading this stuff," Potter randomly pointed out. "And stop sniffing his pillow."

"Congratulations for actually making sense of your own handwriting," Sirius mumbled lazily as he moved the pillow to under his head. He turned sideways, his mug facing James. His fingers manly played with his longish hair as he pondered the second T. "So... does that mean I can touch him and caress him and hug him and snog him?" He buried his nose in the pillow again, mumbling, "If it does, then it's the first step to actually make sense."

"Whatever you decide to do, just please... keep me out of it."

Sirius closed his eyes. "Brilliant. Continue."

James huffed for a moment, and then uttered, "This 'E' here means 'ease off temporarily'." He stared at Sirius. "You know what that means?"

"Cheers, but I'm not a total idiot." Sirius opened his eyes and watched James back. "It means that when I'm ravishing him, I should let him go to the loo every now and then. That goes without saying."

"Yeah... no." James shook his head. And scratching his nose, he elaborated, "It means you must stop acting the way you've acted during the previous steps. Completely. This will... confuse him and make him think that there's something wrong with him, and because he's falling for you at this point, he'll do just about anything to be with you."

Sirius sat up, now appalled. The pillow he brought to his lap. "There's nothing wrong with my Remus! Are you an idiot, James? I'm sure as hell not going to do any of that. Dreadful."

"You might not want to, but it's essential." Potter gravely stared at him back. "Descend on being merely a friend again."

Suddenly Sirius stood up and walked to the bathroom with the pillow. James heard him shout from the room, "Tell me, how on bloody Earth will I be able to leave him alone after all that hugging and touching?"

"What are you doing with the pillow?"

Naturally Sirius didn't answer him.

"All right," James resumed without hearing an answer. "I knew the second last would be the hardest for you." He put the paper down on the bed and rubbed the bridge of his now sweaty nose. Then he realised something and stared at the open bathroom door. "Wait... Which step you thought was about hugging and touching?"

Sirius' head emerged in the door frame. "The fourth one? You know, the tic-tac-toe one?"

"The tacit declaration?" James asked, bringing a hand to ruffle his hair for no apparent reason. "No, you got it wrong. It means you'll have to be subtle."

"Subtle? Are you serious?" Sirius laughter echoed from the bathroom as he had vanished there again. "How do you even know such a word?"

"You have to be subtle, Sirius," Potter tried, flailing his hands in the air a bit, emphasising the words to absolutely no one. "No touching, and no overly wordy love declarations, which you're probably going to do. Remember what you said to Minnie? Do not, and I repeat, do not say any of that to Moony. He would die."

Sirius came back from the bathroom with the pillow and hugging it against his chest, he stopped in front of his firiend and tilted his head at him. "How am I going to let him know that I fancy him, then? Jamesie, you haven't thought this through at all."

"I don't know, stare at him like the madman you are, you've been doing a great job so far." James smirked nastily at him but suddenly got serious. He watched Sirius lower himself on his bed again. "Just... forget the touching, okay? It might get ugly."

"You're ugly. Whereas we," Sirius said, and gestured at himself and the pillow. "Me and pillow-Remus are beautiful. Look at us."

"Yeah, he seems lovely," James muttered, frowning at the pillow. He took the paper from the bed, turned it over in his hands and pointed the last step to the boy. "Look here; the last letter 'R'. It stands for 'restraint and rapture'."

Sirius made a face and pressed his jaw on the pillow. "Meaning?"

"Meaning that once you've restraint yourself from his company for a little while – stop making that idiotic face – he's going to fancy you so much he's going bananas just for seeing you. Which means you can basically do whatever you want with him." James ogled at Sirius, who was watching him back. "Jusk ask his permission first." Then he was silent for a moment. "And don't mention the pillow to him."

Sirius stared at him. "I don't like bananas."

Potter ignored him. "Once he's realised how much he fancies you and confronts you for it, you can turn him into a shaking pile of pudding by slobbering his face off, after which you two will of course live happily ever after like the little princesses that you are. Naturally this results in you leaving me alone for a bloody second; everyone is happy and we'll probably have cake."

"If Remus really falls for me because of this, then he's not the smartest bloke I know."

Snorting, James asked, "Who said he was?"

Sirius stood up, leaving the pillow behind, and walked over to his friend. He lowered his hand on James' shoulder, and said gravely, "James... Your system is the most idiotic thing I have ever seen, but I am desperate enough to try it."

James beamed up at him. "You know, there's a great difference between what you think is idiotic and you being an idiot. And I think you just mixed those two up."

"Yes, but there's absolutely no difference between you being idiotic and you writing your idiotic things down on paper."