DISCLAIMER: The Harry Potter series and all of its characters belong to J. K. Rowling. I'm only borrowing them, and I am not making any profit off of this story.
Sirius Black had a passing familiarity with Muggle religions, and he knew that most of them had some concept of hell. They imagined a place where fire and brimstone fell from the skies, where one lived in a house without sunlight and ate dust for eternity, where demons whipped the skin from one's body and devoured the flesh from one's bones.
It could not be clearer to him that no Muggle had ever been in here.
It was cold, constantly cold; the chill sea wind seemed to cut straight through his body and Sirius often thought, as he pulled his tattered robes about him and curled up under the single threadbare blanket on his bed, that a bit of fire and brimstone would be a welcome respite. The chill of the environment was matched by a different kind of cold entirely, one that no amount of fire could warm.
The worst part about being surrounded by dementors, however, had nothing to do with the cold.
AAAAAAA
"Switch with me, Peter."
"M-me, Sirius? Wouldn't R-Remus be better?"
"I want you to do it because you're the one he's least likely to come after." Sirius didn't want to share his suspicions about Remus. For some time now he had known that Voldemort was getting more information than could be explained by cunning alone; his latest attacks on Lily and James, and his timing in executing them, had been just a little too convenient. There had to be a leak. Somehow, Voldemort was getting information from the inside, and who better to provide it than the person who had the most frequent close contact with James, whom James had been supporting ever since they left school?
"Listen," Sirius continued. "We think he knows about the Fidelus and he's bound to go after the Secret-Keeper to find out where they are. When that happens, I want him to come after me. I'll be the decoy; he'll try to get the information out of me, while all the while their secret will be safe with you."
AAAAAAA
The dementors were bringing in another prisoner.
The boy couldn't have been a day over nineteen. His straw-colored hair was stuck to his forehead, and the freckles on his face stood out against his milk-white skin. He was shaking uncontrollably.
As the cell door swung shut behind him, the boy started to scream. "No! Don't! Let me out of here, let me go! Please! Please! I didn't do it, I'm innocent!"
I'm innocent…
That's right, Sirius thought. Innocent. It was hard to remember, though. Hard not to blame himself for James's death. And Sirius did not feel like an innocent man…
AAAAAAA
Peter wasn't there.
Nothing whatsoever seemed amiss, and it was that more than anything that had Sirius worried. There was no overturned furniture or broken crockery. The candles on the table had even been snuffed, as if Peter had just decided to step out for a few minutes.
But Sirius had warned him, multiple times, that he mustn't step out, he mustn't leave his hiding place, that if he did he ran the risk of getting caught and tortured for information. Not even Peter would be that stupid. Not unless…
Unless…
Oh dear Merlin.
No…
AAAAAAA
"Mother! MOTHER! HELP ME, MOTHER, GET ME OUT OF HERE!"
It was nightfall, and the boy had begun to scream. He clawed at his face and clutched at himself until the nails dug into his skin, drawing blood.
"I'LL BE GOOD, I SWEAR I'LL BE GOOD, JUST GET ME OUT OF HERE, I WON'T DO IT AGAIN, I SWEAR, JUST HELP ME, PLEASE HELP ME!"
AAAAAAA
Sirius felt the bottom drop out of his stomach. It couldn't be, it just couldn't be…
Yet there was no mistaking the smoldering ruin that had once been the home of Lily and James Potter. He landed the motorbike with a jolt that shook every bone in his body and staggered over to the house.
Somebody was already there.
A figure easily twice his height stood in the midst of the rubble, tossing bits of wrecked house aside. Sirius approached numbly, picking his way over twisted metal and splintered wood, all the while dreading what he would find…
He saw James's body first. He lay on the ground, fists clenched, hazel eyes open, his expression one of mingled fear and grim determination. His wand was nowhere in sight.
"Hey, who's there?" a rough voice called. "Show yerself! I warn yeh, I'm armed!"
Sirius lit his wand and held it close to his face. "It's me, Hagrid."
"Sirius Black?" The figure was picking its way toward him through the rubble. "Thought yeh migh' come by. That yeh migh' wan' ter… ter see for yerself…"
Sirius's wandlight now encompassed Hagrid, and he could see a shock of red hair falling from under the man's arm. Lily. And in his other arm…
Something began to cry and whimper, and Hagrid set Lily's body gently on the ground before turning to his other burden. "There, there, it's all righ' now, I got yeh…"
Almost as if his body had acted on its own Sirius found himself moving closer to Hagrid, standing on tiptoe to see. The boy lay squirming in the palm of Hagrid's hand, miraculously alive and unhurt even though a house had just fallen on top of him. Just visible beneath a tuft of his jet-black hair was a strangely-shaped cut, a cut that looked like a bolt of lightning.
Harry had lived. James was dead, but somehow, miraculously, his son had lived. James might be gone forever, but there was still a part of him left, right here…
"Give Harry to me, Hagrid," Sirius heard himself saying. "I'm his godfather, I'll look after him…" But Hagrid shook his head.
"Sorry, can'. I've had me orders from Dumbledore. He's ter go to his aunt an' uncle's, and I can' let nobody tell me differen'."
He argued, but Hagrid didn't budge. Sirius honestly didn't expect him to, if the order had come from Dumbledore himself. Besides, he didn't feel as if he were worthy of raising James's son. Not when he couldn't tell a friend from a traitor.
Traitor…
"Hagrid," he said, coming to a decision. "Take the motorbike. Use it to get Harry to his relatives. I won't need it anymore."
Hagrid looked surprised for a moment, but he nodded. When he'd gotten on the motorbike with Harry, he turned toward Sirius and laid a hand on his shoulder. "James an' Lily shouldn've died, Sirius. Dumbledore'll see to it that they get a… a decen' burial…"
Sirius nodded. His throat seemed to have closed; he couldn't speak.
Hagrid seemed to understand. He revved the bike and it leaped into the sky with a blast of exhaust. Sirius watched until they were out of sight.
He transformed.
Four paws hit the pavement, his ears pricked, and Sirius bent his nose to the ground, sniffing for any last trace of the rat.
He was going to kill Peter Pettigrew, and not even Voldemort himself was going to stop him.
AAAAAAA
The boy was dying.
Sirius could tell by the way the dementors flitted about excitedly outside of his cell, could tell by the way their death-rattle breathing had changed to match his, until all that could be heard throughout the entire prison was the ragged gasps of the boy matched by the hungry rattling breaths of the dementors around him.
Soon after it became clear that the boy's death was coming, a tall gray-haired man walked past Sirius's cell supporting his wispy, blond wife. The boy's parents, it must be, coming to pay him a deathbed visit.
He hadn't even lasted a year.
Sirius couldn't look; he turned away, stared at the stones in the wall of his cell. Some time later, he didn't know how long, he heard the door of the other cell opening again. When he glanced over he saw the boy's parents leaving, the man half-carrying his wife, faint from distress and from the effects of the dementors.
Sirius couldn't take it anymore. Before he knew it his head was lengthening, his nails sharpening into claws as black fur sprouted all over his body. His four paws hit the floor and he almost sighed in relief as the flood of emotions inside of him subsided to a dull throb. The magnified screams of the other prisoners and the now overwhelming stench of excrement and putrid, rotting flesh was a small price to pay for this one small measure of inner peace.
Not even a dog could be happy in this place.
But neither could a dog feel guilt.
AAAAAAA
How long had he been in here?
Sirius had long ago lost track of time, though he knew it must have been years since they brought him in. There was no means of telling time here, save the position of the sun, the phases of the moon (what was Remus doing now, anyway?), and the slight changes in temperature that indicated the passing of seasons. After all, there was no reason for the Ministry to provide calendars or clocks to a group of raving madmen, for all of them did go mad in the end.
All of them except for Sirius.
Though he might in some measure have James and Lily's blood on his hands, though he had been instrumental in their murders, he knew that it was not he who had betrayed his friends, not he who had given their whereabouts to Voldemort. That responsibility was Peter's, and Peter's alone. The only crime Sirius had ever committed was a grave misplacement of trust.
His musings were interrupted when a man walked by his cell. Some Ministry official in for an inspection; they had them once a year, at least. It was a different person every time, probably because no one could stand to come here more than once. Today it was a portly little man in a pinstriped cloak and a lime-green bowler with which he was constantly fiddling. He had something tucked under his arm, something Sirius suddenly realized he wanted…
"Excuse me." The man jumped about five feet in the air and looked around wildly for the source of the voice; obviously he had not expected any of the prisoners to have retained enough sanity to manage coherent speech. Sirius waved at him from inside of his cell.
"Is that today's paper?" Looking more flustered than ever, the man nodded. "Are you finished with it? I miss doing the crossword, you see…"
"Well, of course, I… dear me, I don't see why not…"
All the same he backed away from the cell door and held it at arm's length, as if afraid that Sirius would reach out and grab him if given half a chance. Sirius had to lean right up against the bars and stretch out his arm as far as he could in order to take the paper.
"Thanks." He smiled at the man, who muttered something incomprehensible before hurrying off again. It occurred to Sirius that he must look rather menacing by now.
The first thing he did was look at the date, and when he realized just how long he had been here his knees grew weak, and he sank down onto the floor of his cell. Twelve years… had it really been that long since he had confronted Pettigrew in the middle of the street? How could it be that James had died a full twelve years ago, when his death was still an open wound that hadn't even begun to heal?
Twelve years… Harry must be in school by now. Sirius wondered if he'd been sorted into Gryffindor, if he played Quidditch like his father. If the boy hated him because he thought Sirius had betrayed his parents…
Before he could stop himself, he was transforming again. The black dog growled, pacing the cell, and it was only his awareness of the Ministry official's continued presence that kept him from howling his misery to the uncaring sky.
AAAAAAA
Over the next few days the paper became a lifeline of sorts; it was his only connection to the outside world. Sirius read it slowly, savoring every page, making himself wait a full day before he looked at the next article. On the fifth day, however, he saw something that made the blood freeze in his veins.
Pettigrew.
He had spent twelve long years thinking the traitor must have fled to some distant country and gone into hiding. Yet here he was right under Dumbledore's nose, a rat missing a toe, sitting on the shoulder of a boy the paper said was currently attending Hogwarts.
He's at Hogwarts.
Where Harry was.
He's at Hogwarts.
Perfectly positioned to act… to kill Harry… to deliver James's son to Voldemort, who would subject him to countless horrors before he delivered the finishing blow… Sirius knew; he had never forgotten what his cousin had done to the Longbottoms…
The ice in his veins was instantly vaporized as a flaming rage filled his entire body. That rat had betrayed his best friend to his death; Sirius was determined that he wouldn't betray James's son as well.
He wouldn't live long enough. Sirius would see to that.
AAAAAAA
The door of his cell opened. It was the dementors, bringing food: dry bread (no mold, if one was lucky) and a small helping of water.
The black dog slipped through the cell door in the few seconds it was open. He ran. He could no longer see the dementors through his dog's eyes, only a plethora of dark shapes that swooped around him, trying to surround him, to corner him… He shot through them, heart pounding… His ears swiveled; he could hear their death-rattle breathing with perfect clarity, and knew their locations with pinpoint precision…
Though his emotions were stunted when he was a dog his intellect remained intact, and both of these factors worked overwhelmingly to his advantage. While the dementors searched blindly for him, unable to get a fix on his simpler animal emotions, Sirius was running to the end of the ward… after all these years, he could still remember where they had brought him in, and now he had only to retrace his footsteps in reverse…
The bars at the end of the ward were close together but would admit the passage of someone very skinny, and Sirius had been severely underfed for twelve solid years. He pushed his head and shoulders through the bars and was heaving himself the rest of the way through when he was pulled up short with a jerk. He was stuck, half in and half out, with his hips caught on the bars that were not quite wide enough to admit him.
He whined and struggled, his back paws scrabbling for purchase on the stone floor behind him. Pain shot through his feet; in his wild panic he thought that he had surely ripped his claws straight out. Cold swept through the air behind him… he should have known the dementors would not remain confused for long…
With a yelp Sirius changed back into a man; he heaved the rest of his body through the bars just as a slimy, rotting hand closed over the spot where his ankle had been only seconds before. He got to his feet and ran. The cold, instead of lessening, seemed to increase… the dementors were excited, they knew where he was now… he could see Lily and James's ruined house, their dead bodies, and he knew that it was all his fault…
He stumbled. He could not catch himself; he was falling, headlong, toward the ground… he threw his hands out in front of him…
It was not his fault. It was Peter's.
…and Sirius landed on his front paws, the image of his best friend's death fading mercifully into the background. He bunched up his muscles and ran, his four feet sturdy over the uneven ground. A chill wind ruffled his fur, bringing the fresh, briny scent of the sea to his nostrils… he could hear the waves crashing onto the rocks… He ran toward that scent… the dog's inner compass was telling him which way he needed to swim in order to reach the mainland…
He had come to the island's edge. Waves pounded and crashed against the jagged rocks below him. If he decided to brave that savage sea, the chances of survival were minimal.
But then again, risk had always been a part of his life. Sirius would rather die escaping than go back to the dementors, and he knew that James would not shrink from risking his own life when his son's was in danger.
Sirius thought of Harry and leaped.
A/N: Well, this is my first ever real fanfic and I hope that you liked it. A few things I learned from writing this story:
-I hate writing Hagrid's dialogue. I don't think I've seen a fanfic author yet (myself included) who's managed to get it completely right.
-Just writing about Azkaban for extended periods of time is enough to have a negative effect on one's psyche. When I first started working on this story I felt really down and emotionally drained for the rest of the day. When you consider what it must actually be like in there, it's no wonder the prisoners go mad.
The idea of the dementors breathing in unison with a dying person was actually first used by H. P. Lovecraft (he did it with whippoorwills), and it was just so delightfully creepy that I couldn't resist paying tribute to it here.