Author’s Note: I just wanted to give you all a warning about the time gap. I said in my summary that this fic was glimpses into Remus’s seven years at Hogwarts, but I still worried people might be confused by the sudden jump from about early-May in Remus’s first year to one week into his third year. This is a chronological fic (I will not be bouncing back and forth between years like a ferret, I promise), but there will be some significant time gaps, especially in these earlier chapters.
Thanks to Kaity (tonks_the_dreamer) for your enthusiasm, Jenny for your inspiration, and Fiona (roisin_dubh) for your ability to cope with my occasionally abysmal grammar.
Now I will shut up and let James do the talking.
Stupid Ideas
“You look like shit.”
It was Sunday afternoon and James had just returned to his dormitory after the first Quidditch practice of his Third Year to find Remus lying on his bed looking truly dreadful. Sirius and Peter were sitting on either side of the end of Remus’s bed, looking concerned. Last night had been the first full moon of the term. Either James had forgotten over the summer just how awful Remus looked when he returned from his transformations, or last night’s transformation had been particularly brutal. He was covered in painful looking scratches and bites, and his arm was bound up in a sling.
“I feel like shit,” Remus replied.
“Well,” said James, smiling in spite of himself, “you know what they say: If it looks like shit, and it feels like shit, and…” He gave a great sniff. A truly rancid smell filled his nose. “Merlin, Remus, that’s disgusting!”
“It wasn’t him,” said Sirius. “Peter cut one just before you came in.”
“Oh, well then, never mind,” said James, depositing his Quidditch gear on the floor and sitting down on Remus’s bed next to Sirius. “Rough night last night, Remus?”
“Oh no,” said Remus very sarcastically. “It was just rainbows and lollipops as usual.”
“You’re always so tetchy after full moon,” James observed.
“Wonder why that is,” said Remus grumpily. He adjusted himself a little on the bed and winced.
“Seriously through,” said James, “you look really awful. What happened?”
Remus shrugged, wincing again. “Some times are just worse than others,” he replied.
“Want us to leave you alone so you can get some rest?” Sirius asked.
“Oh, you guys don’t have to leave,” said Remus uncomfortably. “I mean, I don’t want to kick you out of your own dormitory.”
“You don’t look like you’re in a state to kick anything at the moment,” said Sirius. “We’ll leave you alone, we really don’t mind. We’ll come back to bother you in a few hours. That sound good?”
Remus smiled and nodded his approval. Sirius, Peter, and James all stood up and left the dormitory.
“Merlin, I’ve seen dead people who look better than he does right now,” said James as they descended the spiral staircase.
“You have?” asked Peter.
“No, I was just making a point.”
“He always looks like that after full moon,” Sirius pointed out.
“That still doesn’t make it okay,” said James.
No, it wasn’t okay. But there was nothing Sirius could do about it at the moment, so he changed the subject. “How was practice?” he asked as the three of them took seats in the common room.
“Pretty good,” said James. “Brian got to go to the World Cup this summer in Japan. He got to see the best Quidditch players in the world right up close. He’s worked out a whole new training program from all the stuff in learned.” There was considerably more than a little jealousy in James’s voice.
“A little eager though, isn’t he? Starting practice the first weekend of term, I mean,” said Sirius.
“Yeah, well,” said James, “you know Brian. Any moment not spent playing Quidditch is a moment wasted.”
“Kind of like you?” Sirius asked, grinning.
“Yeah,” said James, “but even I’m not as obsessed as he is.”
“I didn’t think that was possible,” said someone behind him standing just behind him. James turned to see his fellow third-year Delangela Narkin.
Delangela was short, blond, and opinionated. But mostly, she was just loud. Though petite, she had an attractive figure, and boys admired a similar a beautiful arrogance in her face that girls admired in Sirius’s. She had long, thick hair and a voice that could be heard from halfway across the castle grounds, which she enjoyed using, particularly for gossip.
“Eavesdrop much?” Sirius asked Delangela as she took a seat by the three boys.
“You’re sitting in the middle of the common room and you weren’t exactly whispering,” Delangela snapped at him. “Fair game for eavesdroppers if you ask me.”
“No one asked you,” said Sirius.
“No one needed to,” said Delangela.
James rolled his eyes. Everyone knew that Delangela had fallen in love with Sirius from the moment she had set eyes on him. She spent half of her time with him flirting and the other half fighting. She seemed to derive equal enjoyment from both. No one was quite sure if Sirius liked her in the same way. He never reciprocated her flirtatious advances, but he appeared to have quite as much fun with their verbal sparring matches as she did.
At the moment, however, James was not in the mood to listen to them bicker/flirt, so he cut across Sirius’s impending retort by asking Delangela how her summer was.
“Boring,” said Delangela, a little melodramatically. “Honestly, there’s nothing to do around my place in the summer.”
“No one to eavesdrop on?” Sirius asked.
“Tell Delangela about your summer, Peter,” James instructed.
Peter prattled for a little about his holiday in France while Delangela and Sirius had a silent glaring match. When Peter finished, Delangela asked, “So what about you, Black? How was your summer?”
Sirius shrugged. “Not all that interesting.”
“You’re a great conversationalist,” Delangela said.
“Here’s an idea: why don’t you go talk to other people,” Sirius suggested.
“Fine!” Delangela snapped. She stood up and stalked away.
“So, nothing at all interesting around ‘The Noble and Most Ancient House of Black’ this summer?” James asked Sirius once Delangela had left.
Sirius gave James a cold look for using the phrase ‘The Noble and Most Ancient House of Black’ and said, “Not really.” He picked up a copy of The Daily Prophet that someone had left on the table near them and began to flick through it. “I mean, except for my cousin,” he added unexpectedly.
“Which cousin? What about them?” asked James.
“My cousin Andromeda,” Sirius said, not lowering the paper.
“I’ve heard of her before,” said James. “She’s the only one you can stand, right?”
“Yeah,” said Sirius.
“What about her?” James asked.
Sirius sighed and lowered the paper, resigning to the fact the he had somehow suckered himself into telling a story about his family, a subject he usually put a lot of effort into avoiding. This was a happy story though, so he figured it was okay to continue.
“I told you Andromeda eloped last Christmas, right?” Sirius asked his friends.
“With a Muggle-born,” James said, remembering.
“Right. Anyway, couple of weeks ago, her sister Narcissa went to go and try and talk some ‘sense’ into her.”
“Narcissa,” James mused. “Now is she the dark-haired, root-of-all-evil one, or the stuck up blond one who’s going out with that Malfoy?”
“The stuck up blond one,” said Sirius. “Well, she went over to Andromeda’s new place with her husband to see if she could ‘reason’ with Andromeda, only to find…” Sirius trailed off.
“What?” asked James.
Sirius gave a small smile, “The baby’s due in November.”
“Brilliant!” James laughed. “So I guess this means Narcissa was unsuccessful?”
“Yep,” said Sirius. “I think it’s really cool. Andromeda’s always been the only one in the family who I thought had any sense. I’m proud she married Ted; he’s a great guy. And now they’re having a baby and they could give crap what the family thinks.”
“I suppose that would make you and Andromeda the ‘Black’ sheep of the family,” said James, grinning.
“Very clever, James,” Sirius said, his voice heavy with dry sarcasm. “Did you come up with that one all on your own?”
“I did, as a matter of fact.”
They ended up hanging around in the common room for the rest of the afternoon. When dinnertime came, they decided to go upstairs and wake Remus. This proved useless, as Remus refused to be roused. They tried determinately for a few minutes, poking him, shaking him, shouting in his ear, and tickling his foot. It was only when they heard the semi-conscious Remus emit what they were all pretty sure was a low growl that they abandoned their attempts and left for dinner without him.
“You were right,” Sirius muttered to James. “He is a bit tetchy after full moon.”
After eating their fill at dinner, the three boys headed back to Gryffindor Tower. They were slightly held up by James, who decided to set fire Severus Snape’s pants when he wasn’t looking. James had laughed himself stupid and been assigned detention by Professor McGonagall.
“Why didn’t you guys wake me up?” Remus asked them when they returned to the dormitory.
“We tried, mate,” said Sirius.
“You growled at us,” said Peter.
Remus stared at them. “I did?”
“Yeah,” said Sirius.
Remus looked very troubled by this information. “I’m sorry,” he muttered to the floor.
“It’s not a big deal,” James assured him as he sat down on the end of Remus’s bed. “How’s your arm?” Remus had removed his sling since they had last seen him.
“Better,” he said, stretching it a little. “Just stiff.”
“We snagged you some food if you’re hungry,” said Sirius, holding up a doggie bag.
“Not right now,” Remus said, “but thanks.” Sirius set the food on Remus’s bedside table. “So, did I miss anything interesting today?” Remus asked.
“If you count James setting fire to Snape’s pants interesting,” said Sirius.
“Why did you do that?” Remus asked James.
James shrugged. “It seemed like a good idea at the time.”
Remus gave him a look rather like the one he had just received from McGonagall when she had assigned him his detention, but he didn’t say anything.
“You going to be up for classes tomorrow?” Sirius asked Remus.
“I should be,” said Remus, rubbing his hurt arm with his opposite hand. He looked at James. “I didn’t really growl at you, did I?”
“It’s not a big deal,” James told him again. “Honestly.”
Remus didn’t looked entirely reassured, but he let the subject drop. He was eyeing the doggie bag. “There wouldn’t be any chocolate in there, would there?”
“A brownie,” said Peter.
Remus reached or the bag, opened it, extracted said brownie, and took a huge bite.
“Thought you weren’t hungry,” said James.
Remus shrugged, managing not to wince this time, and swallowed. “Chocolate has healing powers,” he explained.
“Where were you yesterday, Remus?” Lily Evans asked. “I don’t think I saw you once.”
“I wasn’t feeling well.”
“I’m sorry,” she said, sounding genuinely sorry. “Are you feeling better today?”
“Yes, much.”
“Then why aren’t you eating?” Lily asked. It was breakfast, and the four boys were seated toward the end of the long table with Lily Evans and Delangela Narkin. They were munching on bacon, scrambled eggs, and toast. All except Remus.
“He’s full,” Sirius explained. “This morning he binged on the whole stash of Chocolate Frogs I saved from the train last week. Every last frog.”
“You said I could have them,” Remus pointed out. “You offered them to me.”
“I didn’t think you would eat them all.”
“You said that I could have as many as I like.”
“I didn’t know you’d fancy all of them. There had to have been twenty frogs left.”
“Eighteen,” said Remus, repressing a belch.
“That’s a lot of frogs,” said Delangela.
“See,” said Sirius, gesturing to her, “she agrees with me. You’d better have at least saved me the cards.”
“I did, but it’s nobody you don’t already have.”
“What do we have first today?” Peter asked.
“Transfiguration,” said Lily, without bothering to take out her schedule.
“One week into the year and you’ve already got your schedule memorized,” said James. “Try to be more of a nerd, Evans.”
“Try to be more of a git, Potter.”
James’s response was lost to a loud belch from Remus. “Excuse me,” he said, reddening.
“That’s what you get for eating half your weight in someone else’s Chocolate Frogs.”
“Oh, forget it, Black,” said Delangela. “You can always get more frogs when we go to Hogsmeade.”
They spent the rest of breakfast discussing their plans for their very first trip to Hogsmeade. So happily anticipated was the trip that they were still discussing it when they arrived their first hour Transfiguration class.
“I can’t wait to get inside Zonko’s,” Sirius said as they sat down and took out their books.
“Zonko’s products,” said Delangela, rolling her eyes. “Right, Black, that’s exactly what you need: more reasons to get detention.”
“Where do you want to go in Hogsmeade?” Peter asked Lily and Delangela.
“Well, I think it’d be pretty interesting to go see the Shreiking Shack,” said Lily.
“Oh yeah!” Delangela said excitedly. “It’s supposed to be really haunted, the villagers have been hearing screams and yells from inside there for a few years now.” Facing Peter, neither she nor Lily saw Remus reddening again.
“Imagine that,” said Sirius, trying not to smile. Remus kicked him under the desk.
“I love haunted houses,” Lily said, unaware of any awkwardness in the conversation. “My sister and I used to go haunted houses every Halloween. She always got scared, but I thought they were really fun. But they were just pretend haunted houses, you know, Muggle-made. I can’t wait to see a real haunted house.”
“Just so long as whatever’s haunting it doesn’t jump out and bite you,” said Sirius, earning himself another kick.
Just then, Professor McGonagall entered the classroom and they started the lesson. Sirius was only half paying attention. She was teaching them about Animagi this week. He thought it was cool when she transformed herself into a cat right before their eyes, but then she went into a long lecture about the principles behind the Animagus transformation, and Sirius lost interest. He took out a spare piece of parchment and drew up a game of hangman.
“James,” he whispered.
James ignored him.
“James,” he whispered again, poking James with the end of his quill.
“Leave me alone, Sirius, I trying to listen,” James whispered.
Sirius was shocked. James never paid attention in class on lecture days; he didn’t need to. It wasn’t until then that Sirius noticed that James was taking notes.
“What are you doing?!” he hissed at James.
“I’m taking notes,” James replied.
“Why?"
“Shhhh,” James whispered impatiently. He was hanging on Professor McGonagall’s every word.
Extremely confused by his best friend’s odd behavior, Sirius let James be, turned to his other side, and attempted to engage Remus in his hangman game. As Remus was also trying to pay attention and was still angry at Sirius for his leading comments to Lily and Delangela about the Shreiking Shack, he was just as unsuccessful with Remus as he had been with James, and was reduced to crumpling up his hangman game and doodling for the rest of the hour.
“So what’s the deal?” Sirius asked once the lesson had ended and they were packing up their bags.
“Deal?” James asked distractedly.
“Are you trying to suck up to McGonagall, or are you just enthralled by Animagi, or what?” Sirius asked.
“It was an interesting lesson,” said James.
Sirius had the impression he was missing something, but decided to let it go, “If you say so.”
James was distracted for the entire rest of the day. He seemed to be compensating for his unusual attentiveness in Transfiguration by paying even less attention than he normally would in all of his other classes that day. He barely touched his lunch and didn’t even make it to dinner. He disappeared sometime after last period Defense Against the Dark Arts, and though his friends waited in the Great Hall until the end of dinnertime, James failed to turn up.
“He did have detention tonight,” said Remus, looking around at the almost empty Hall they were still sitting in.
“Not this early,” said Sirius, checking his watch. “His detention wouldn’t start until after dinner.”
“You’d think he’d want some food before he had to go,” said Remus. “Was it just me, or was James acting very oddly today?”
“Would you be more or less concerned if I told you it was just you?” asked Sirius.
“Interesting question,” said Remus, thinking it over.
“I thought James was acting strange today,” said Peter, “Did you guys notice that he was taking notes in Transfiguration?”
“Maybe he just wants to get more serious about his studies?” Remus suggested.
“Or he could be losing his marbles,” said Sirius.
“We’ll just have to ask him after his detention,” said Peter.
I must not set fire to other peoples’ pants. I must not set fire to other peoples’ pants.
James sat in Professor McGonagall’s office copying these words over and over (occasionally omitting the “not”; like she was going to read it anyway). He was deciding how best to approach her with a question without making her suspicious. He checked his watch; it was twenty to the hour. Now was as good a time as ever.
“Err, Professor?”
Professor McGonagall looked up from the papers she was grading. “Yes, Potter?”
“I was just thinking about your lesson on Animagi. It was really interesting. I wondered if maybe… if I wanted to learn more… if you could recommend some titles for me?”
Professor McGonagall’s eyebrows contracted. “Are you genuinely interested in Animagi, Potter, or are you trying to get out of detention early?”
“I’m genuinely interested,” he said earnestly. Then he brightened a little. “But “ I mean “ if you wanted to let me out early…”
“You can go at the end of the hour,” she told him sternly. “But I will recommend some books for you if you really want to learn more.”
“Actually, Professor, there was one specific question I had.”
“Fire away.”
“Well…” James hesitated. He pondered how he could phrase his question in such a way that he would get the information he needed, without giving her too much information. “I was just wondering, say there’s something… something that’s only a danger to humans, would… would you be, err, safe from that something if you were a cat?”
“What sort of something?”
Like a werewolf sort of something. “Like “ I don’t know “ something that could only hurt people, not animals. Would an Animagus be safe, err, around it?”
“I would say, as a general rule, yes. But without knowing the specifics, it’s hard to know for sure.”
“Oh,” said James, his heart sinking a little. …hard to know for sure… Did he dare mention werewolves? He decided it was too risky. “Okay, err, thanks Professor.” He returned to his lines. He thought he sensed Professor McGonagall watching him for a minute longer, but she didn’t say anything. She continued grading her papers.
At the end of the hour, she told him he could go.
“Good night, Professor,” he said as he headed for the door.
“Potter?”
He looked back. “Yes?”
“Did you want this list or not?” She was holding out a slip of parchment on which she had written half a dozen book titles.
“Yes,” he said gratefully, walking back to her and taking the list. “Thank you, Professor.”
“You’re welcome, Potter.” He was halfway to the door when she called him back again. “Potter.”
He turned to she her reading the lines he had left lying on the table. “You seemed to have missed a word here and there,” she said.
“Oh, did I?” James asked innocently. “I’m sorry.”
She shook her head in an exasperated fashion, but James could have sworn that she was smiling slightly. “Good night, Potter.”
“Good night, Professor."
James left the office, examining the list Professor McGonagall had given him. The library would probably be closed at this time, so James would have to wait until the next day to search for the titles she had recommended. As he still had the books he had gotten after dinner to look though, he decided just to head straight to Gryffindor Tower.
In the common room he was confronted by Peter, Sirius, and Remus. He shook them off by saying he was really tired and went up to the dormitory. He changed into pajamas, got his books and his wand, climbed into his four-poster, and drew the hangings around him. By the light of his wand, he began studying Animagi. Later, when his roommates came up to bed, James feigned sleeping noises until he was sure the others were settled in. He was up later than anyone else in his dormitory, turning pages as quietly as possible.
For the next three days, James proved just as distracted and elusive as on Monday. He used class time to gaze dreamily off into space, he used mealtimes to go to the library, and he used evenings to read as much as he could while trying to hide from his friends. It wasn’t that he wanted to avoid them, but he wasn’t ready yet to share his idea with them.
Consequentially, his friends couldn’t get a word from him about what he was up to. Most every time they spotted James in the next few days, he had his nose deep in a book. They spent their class time wondering what James was thinking about (and studying), they spent their mealtimes speculating on what evil, book-loving force had possessed James (and eating), and they spent their evenings searching for James (and doing homework, hanging in the common room, etc. - their whole lives didn’t revolve around James after all).
Thursday evening, Sirius, Remus, and Peter returned to the common room after a wasted hour of combing the castle for their elusive friend.
“Honestly,” Sirius said as they climbed back through the portrait hole, “there are only so many places he could be in this castle. Where’s he hiding?
“Looking for Potter?”
Sirius started and turned to the girl who had spoken. “I thought I told you not to eavesdrop anymore,” Sirius told Delangela.
“Fine,” she said, “I guess I won’t tell you where he is.” She started to walk away.
“Wait!” Remus said. Delangela turned back. “Have you seen him?” Remus asked.
“He’s in the library,” Delangela said.
“Ha ha, very funny, Del,” Remus said sarcastically, “Where is he really?”
“I’m not joking,” she said, “he’s in the library.”
She walked away. Remus stared confusedly after her while Sirius rounded on Peter.
“Peter, are you a vampire?” Sirius asked.
“What?” Remus and Peter asked together.
“Are you a vampire?” Sirius asked Peter again.
“No,” said Peter.
“Are you sure?”
“I think I would know!”
“Sirius, what are you on about?” Remus asked.
“I want to know why James is in the library,” said Sirius.
“So do I,” said Remus. “I didn’t think he even knew where the library was. But what does this have to do with Peter being a vampire?”
“James knows where the library is,” said Sirius, “but he’s only been there once before. It was the night he discovered that a certain someone - I’m not saying who - but that someone was a certain type of magical creature and that was why that someone was gone every full moon.”
“Very cryptic,” said Remus.
“So,” continued Sirius, “if James is in the library, it makes sense that he’s made a similar discovery. I know that I’m not a magical creature of any type, James is the one in the library, and we already know about you, so that leaves Peter.”
“Well when you use that kind of logic,” said Remus, rolling his eyes.
“Why a vampire though?” asked Peter.
“Why not a vampire?” asked Sirius.
“Again with the logic,” said Remus.
“I’m not a vampire, Sirius.”
“Are you any other kind of magical creature?”
“No.”
“Hiding anything?”
“No.”
“What about you?” Sirius asked Remus. “Any other secrets you want to fill us in on?”
“Yes,” said Remus. “I’m a vampire.”
“Really?” asked Peter.
“No.”
“Well then,” said Sirius, “I guess there’s only one thing left to do.”
“To the library?”
“To the library!”
And so they went to the library. James wasn’t there.
“So, Narkin was lying?” asked Sirius.
“I knew it couldn’t be true,” said Remus. “You just don’t hear the words ‘James Potter’ and ‘library’ in a sentence together.”
“James Potter?” asked a boy sitting at a nearby table, looking up from his work.
“You’ve seen him?” Sirius asked the boy.
“He left about ten minutes ago.”
“Damn,” Sirius whispered. “Back to the common room then?”
“To the common room!” said Peter.
“You’d think we’d have run into him on the way down,” Remus said as left the library and headed back to the common room.
“Maybe he found a new shortcut,” said Sirius.
James wasn’t in the common room, so they went to check the dormitory. The hangings were drawn around James’s bed and they could hear his slow, sleepy breathing.
“Reckon he’s asleep, or faking again?” Sirius asked.
“We could wait to hear a page turn,” Remus suggested.
“Look,” said Peter, pointing at James’s bedside table. His glasses were sitting on it. The absence of his glasses on the table had been a clue to what James had actually been doing in bed for the past three nights.
“So he’s sleeping?” asked Remus.
“Let’s find out,” said Sirius. He went over to James’s bed and pulled back the hangings. James was very clearly in a deep sleep.
“Should we wake him?” Sirius asked the other two.
“No,” said Remus. “We’ll talk to him tomorrow.”
James effectively avoided his friends for most of the next day. He missed breakfast, lunch, and dinner (don’t worry, he wasn’t starving himself; he made regular trips to the kitchens to get food from the house elves). He never offered them the opportunity to talk to him between or during classes. It wasn’t until after dinner that they thought they had any chance of talking to him.
“Where should we check first?” Peter asked as they deposited their bags in the common room.
“Let’s check the dormitory,” said Remus.
“He won’t be up there,” said Sirius. “That’s much too obvious.”
“He probably isn’t up there,” said Remus. “But we’re all going to feel really stupid if we search the entire castle for him and then find out he was in the dormitory the whole time.”
“Fair enough,” said Sirius.
They went up to the dormitory. Remus had been right to suggest they check there. They opened the door and walked in to find James sitting on his bed reading a thick and very old looking library book. About a dozen more equally thick and old looking books sat in a stack on the end of his bed. James was so deeply immersed in his book that he didn’t even seem to realize that he was no longer alone.
Sirius walked straight over to James, snatched his book away from him, and slammed it shut.
“Hey-"
“Alright, bookworm, that’s enough,” Sirius said, as Remus and Peter took seats on Remus’s bed, which was next to James’s. “You’ve been avoiding us for days and every time we turn around you’ve got your face stuck in a bloody book. We want to know what you’re on about!”
James was trying to take his book back from Sirius. “You lost my page, you prat!”
Sirius read the front cover of the book before throwing it back at James. “Tales of the Animagi.“ He strode to the end of James’s bed and began to sift through the pile of books there, reading their titles aloud as he did. “A Beginners Guide to Animagi, The Animagi Chronicles, Man and Beast: A Study of Animagi, Animagi Throughout the Ages, Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About “ wait for it “ Animagi, Becoming an Animagus-"
“I’m sensing a theme,” Remus mused.
Sirius continued with the pile, “- My Life as an Animagus, The Diaries of Animagi, Regulations and Bi-Laws of the Animagus Transformation, The Creature Within: A Complete Guide to Animagi Magic, Animagi for Dummies, Ways of the Animagi, and The Many Dangers of Werewolves.” Sirius looked up at James, turning the last book over in his hands. Behind him, Remus was looking at James with a very hurt expression. Sirius said, “Interesting reading choices. Care to explain?”
James threw an apologetic look a Remus before taking The Many Dangers of Werewolves from Sirius and starting to explain. “Well, you know in class when McGonagall was telling us about Animagi? I thought it sounded really interesting, what she was saying, and-"
“Is that why you were paying attention in class?” Sirius asked. “Because you’re seriously interested in Animagi? Thank goodness; I thought you were losing your marbles.”
Ignoring Sirius, James continued, “And I came up with this idea, and… I didn’t know if it would work, so I went to the library to get these books, and… well, I found this.” He opened The Many Dangers of Werewolves to a page he had marked earlier and read allowed, “The werewolf, however, though a danger to humans, does not present as severe a threat to fellow beasts. Werewolf packs will, on occasion, hunt other animals for sport, but the lone wolf seldom prefers the taste of any blood but that of humans. In the rare event a werewolf does bite an animal, the bite will not curse the creature as it would a human. Lycanthropy came only be passed from person to person.” James looked up at his friends to see them all watching him uncomprehendingly.
“James, I could have told you that,” said Remus, still looking a little hurt.
“What’s lycanthropy?” Peter asked.
“It means werewolfismness,” said Sirius.
“Oh.”
“What does that have to do with Animagi?” Sirius asked James.
“Listen to this,” said James, putting down The Many Dangers of Werewolves and reaching for the book he had been reading when they had come in, Tales of the Animagi. “This book has first hand accounts from Animagi over the last few centuries. This is from a woman who could turn into a bear: One night, as I ventured through the woods by the light of the full moon, I found myself in the midst of another part-human part-animal: a werewolf. My immediate reaction was that of fear, but the creature did not attempt to harm me. Once assured of my safety, I journeyed with him into the night. He made no attempt to bite me or drive me away, but seemed to appreciate my company. Not until we had reached the edge of the wood and saw a human did he become violent. I managed to hold the werewolf away from the human to give him time to flee. Once we were alone again, his violence subsided, and he was peaceful once more. I imagine that the creature benefited from having a part-human companion with him that night, it seemed to bring out his own human side, despite the full moon.” James looked up again. Peter still looked confused. Remus looked stricken. Sirius, however, was smiling.
“Brilliant,” he told James.
“What’s brilliant?” Peter asked.
“Don’t you see, Peter? We could become Animagi!” said Sirius. “Then we could turn into animals. We could be with Remus at the full moon!”
Peter’s mouth fell open. Remus was giving Sirius a very cold look. “That,” Remus said, “is the stupidest idea I’ve ever heard.”
“What about the idea I had last year about blowing up the girls’ toilet on the third floor?” asked Sirius. “We smelled like poo for a week.”
“Yeah,” said James, “or what about my idea to put itching powder in Snivellus’s pants?”
“And he got the wrong pants,” said Peter.
“Or Peter’s idea to put a permanent sticking charm on Cal Hornby and his teddy bear?”
“Or Sirius’s slightly modified version of Peter’s idea where we put a permanent sticking charm on Cal Hornby’s hand and his-"
“Oh yeah! I forgot about that,” laughed Sirius. “Lucky for him that idea never came to anything.”
“And what about James’s idea to eat the fuzzy Beatie Bott’s Every Flavor Bean on the train ride here?” asked Peter.
“That was revolting,” said Sirius, sticking out his tongue in disgust.
“Okay,” said James, “but what about your idea to use the Invisibility Cloak to peep in the girls dormitory?”
“How was I supposed to know the stairs would melt into a slide and we would fall on our arses?” asked Sirius. “What about your genius idea to go vine swinging from the branches of the Whomping Willow?”
“I maintain that idea would have been fun,” said James stubbornly.
“Yes, well, those of us who don’t have a death wish maintain that it would have been stupid,” said Sirius, equally as stubborn.
“Okay, but what about when you wanted to set a crate of tarantulas lose in the Transfiguration classroom?” James countered. Peter shuddered.
Sirius grinned mischievously, “McGonagall would have gone mental.”
“She would have,” James agreed, smiling as well. “Hey, remember my idea to put a freezing charm on Snivellus’s pants?”
“That one you followed through on,” said Peter.
“I know,” said James, a reminiscent gleam in his eyes. “It was brilliant.”
“Remember my idea to leave treacle tarts with Dung Bombs concealed in them in the Slytherin Quidditch team’s locker room?” asked Peter.
“They’d have had to have been stupid enough to eat them,” James pointed out.
“The collective brain power of the Slytherin Quidditch team isn’t enough to power a Hiccup Charm,” said Sirius.
“Remember my idea to set fire to Snivellus’s pants?” asked James.
“Yeah,” said Sirius, “I’ve been meaning to ask you about that, James: what is it with you and Snivellus Snape’s pants?”
James flashed a wicked smile. “Maybe if we ruin enough pairs of Snivellus’s pants, he won’t have any left. Then we can hang him by his ankles so that his robes fall down and we can show the whole school his underpants.”
“That would never work,” said Sirius.
“Well now I have to do it just to prove you wrong.”
“Remember my idea to kidnap Mrs. Norris?” asked Sirius.
“I still have the scratch marks,” said James and Peter together.
Then, James said, “What about the idea I came up with in first year? You know, the one with the Filibuster Fireworks and the Bubble-Blowing Charm and the Fizzing Whizzbees and the Muggle wrench and the purple loufa and-"
“ALRIGHT! ALRIGHT!” Remus shouted exasperatedly, bringing an abrupt end to the completely irrelevant ‘stupid ideas’ tangent. “Maybe it’s not the stupidest idea I’ve ever heard, but that doesn’t make it a good idea.”
“Oh, come on, Remus,” said James, sliding his feet to the floor to sit on the edge of his bed, “it’s a great idea. We become Animagi, then we can hang out with you at full moon and-"
“And how completely mental do you have to be to want to ‘hang out’ with a werewolf at full moon? I don’t want to ‘hang out’ with me at full moon!”
“But you don’t like being alone at the full moon either,” James pointed out.
“No,” Remus admitted, “but it’s better that way. It’s safe.”
“Safe is boring,” whined Sirius.
“Maybe when the only thing you have to gamble is detention,” Remus snapped. “The game’s a little different when you’re risking being bitten!”
“But you wouldn’t bite us, we’d be animals!”
“That doesn’t mean I couldn’t hurt you!” Remus shouted. “Do you think I would ever forgive myself if I…if I…” He put his elbows on his knees and buried his face in his hands. The others watched him but didn’t say anything. None of them were ready to abandon James’s idea, but they didn’t want to make Remus upset. They exchanged looks, silently begging one another to break the awkward silence. Oddly enough, it was Remus who spoke first.
“And anyway,” he said, raising his head, trying to recapture his calm, reasonable mien, “you can’t become Animagi until you’re of age, and transformation takes years, it wouldn’t do any good.”
“You can’t register as an Animagus until you’re of age,” said James. “There’s a difference.”
“It’s illegal to become an Animagus without registering.”
“That’s less important to us than you might think,” said Sirius with the ghost of a grin.
“You’re mental,” Remus told him flatly.
“Thank you for noticing,” said Sirius.
“I’m not joking,” said Remus, “I really think this is a terrible idea.”
“Well,” said James brightly, “it’s a good thing we don’t need your permission then.”
“I…but I’m the one you’d be doing it for!”
“Still don’t need your permission,” said James.
James and Sirius had clearly lost their grip. Remus needed an ally.
“What do you think about this, Peter?”
Peter looked extremely uncomfortable at having to pick a side. He normally followed along with whatever the others were doing and agreed with what they said. He therefore had a real issue when his friends divided. What if he sided with the wrong friend? Would the others not like him anymore?
After a minute of internal struggle, Peter decided that it would make him look cooler if he sided with rebellion over reason. “I agree with James and Sirius."
Remus wasn’t going to give in that easy. “Do you know how hard it is to become a Animagus? Do you know how dangerous it is?” He directed his words at Peter alone now. The other two were lost causes, but Peter he could scare. “What if something went wrong?” he continued, “You could get hurt. And even if nothing went wrong with the transformation, do you really fancy hanging around with a werewolf at full moon? What if I bit you? What if I attacked you? Even if I can’t pass my curse to you, I could still hurt you. Do you want to put yourself in that kind of danger? And what if the Ministry found out? Do you know what the punishment is for being an unregistered Animagus? Azkaban, that’s what. Do you want to go to Azkaban?”
“No,” said Peter in a small voice.
“Do you what to put yourself in danger?”
“No, I…” He turned to James and Sirius. “Maybe this isn’t such a good idea.”
“Ah come on, Peter,” said James. He got up from his bed to sit on Remus’s on Peter’s other side and put an encouraging arm around Peter’s shoulders. “You’re not going to wimp out on us are you? You’re in Gryffindor! You’re not afraid of a little trouble! And besides, nothing bad is going to happen; you’ll be with us. Me and Sirius will help you with the transformation and we can protect you from the big, scary werewolf. We would never let anything bad happen to you! Don’t you trust us?”
“I…” said Peter, not quite sure where he was going.
“James can’t promise you that Peter,” said Remus. “He can’t promise nothing bad will happen. Think of the consequences, Peter.”
“Think of the benefits, Peter,” said James.
“Yeah,” said Sirius, “think about how cool it would be.”
“Don’t listen to them Peter,” said Remus. “Don’t let them pressure you into doing something you don’t want to do.”
“You’re pressuring him as much,” James snapped at Remus. He then said, to Peter, “Don’t let Remus talk you out doing something fun.”
Why can’t they just argue with each other? Peter thought miserably. Why do they have to argue through me?
“Be reasonable, Peter.”
“Be brave, Peter. Be cool, Peter.”
“Don’t be a fool, Peter.”
“Don’t be lame, Peter.”
“Listen to me, Peter.”
“Don’t listen to Remus, Peter.”
“I…” Peter stammered, looking back and forth between Remus’s concerned frown and James’s encouraging smile. “I don’t…I don’t… I don’t…”
“Oh great,” said James, jumping up from the bed and gesturing dramatically at Peter. “Look what you’ve done to him, Remus. You’ve terrified him! He can’t even speak!”
“Look what I’ve done to him?” said Remus, standing up to face James. “Look what I’ve done to him? You’re the one trying to talk him into something that could get him killed!
“Why are you so set on this?” Remus demanded of James loudly. “Why do you want to do something when you know damn well you could get hurt? You know the danger you’d be in! You know you’d be breaking the law! Why am I having to talk you out of something you already know is completely mental? Why do want to do something so stupid?”
“Because it’s the only thing I can think of!” James yelled.
“The only “ what are you talking about?”
“I’m sick of it!” James burst out.
“Sick of what?”
“I’m sick of seeing you after full moon looking like you’ve been to Hell and back! I’m sick of seeing you miserable and knowing there’s nothing I can do about it! We’re friends; friends are supposed to help each other. You’re suffering and I’m sick of having no way to help you! I’m sick of it! I want to do something, and since I not on the verge of finding a cure for werewolf bites, this was the only thing I could think of. And, no, it’s not perfect, but it’s better…it’s better than doing nothing. Even if it only helps a little, it’s better than doing nothing.”
An awkward pause followed this rather touching outburst. James’s sudden heartfeltness had taken all of them by surprise. Remus could think of nothing to say. What did you say to something like that?
James seemed to deflate a little in the silence. “If you don’t want us to do it, we won’t,” he said in a defeated tone.
Another pause, and then, “You guys would do that, just to help me?”
“Well, there are other benefits to being an Animagus, I’d imagine,” said Sirius, trying to lighten the mood.
“Yeah,” said Peter, “like being able to turn into an animal whenever you want.”
“And Captain Points-Out-The-Obvious-A-Lot strikes again,” said Sirius.
Remus ignored Sirius and Peter and spoke to James, “Are you sure you want to do this?”
“Positive.”
“And you?” Remus asked Sirius.
“’Course.”
“And you too, Peter?”
Peter shifted a little where he sat, “Yeah, okay.”
And Remus made his decision. “Well,” he said matter-of-factly, “I suppose if you guys are going to try this, and not get yourselves killed, you’re going to need all the help you can get. I’m in.”
“YES!” James punched a fist into the air in victory.
“So where do we start?” asked Sirius.
The four of them crammed onto James’s bed as James began explaining all of the research he had done already, and how far they still had to go. The project ahead of them was daunting, but exciting. Remus listened, determined to make it his personal responsibility to insure that none of his friends were harmed.
After all, with an idea this stupendously wonderful and unbelievably stupid, what could possibly go wrong?
Authors Notes: The Many Dangers of Werewolves; bet you didn’t see that one coming! Nor that you could predict the vicious onslaught of insanity that caused me to change the chapter name from “Animagi” to “Stupid Ideas”.
Reviews are always appreciated!