Chapter One

Sirius Black sat at his desk frustrated with his day so far; he had absolutely no work to do. He had been an Auror for over a year now and still had not received a major case or any sort of responsibility.

He thought to himself, there has to be something I could do.

He watched as the director of the Aurora department walked in. Mad Eye Moody was trailed by James Potter. Sirius sneered, although James was his best mate it annoyed Sirius how many more cases Potter got because he was smart enough to ask Mad Eye to be his mentor.

I should have gotten a mentor, Sirius thought.

James wandered over to his desk near Sirius'. Sirius tried to make himself look busy, but since he hadn't had a case in over a month he had no paper work to do or to look over.

"Keeping busy I see." James called to Sirius as he sat down.

"Bug off" Sirius called back.

He went back to pondering the gapping-whole that was his life. His career was going nowhere, he didn't speak to any of his family, but he did have his three best friends to make up for that, and there was no woman in his life to speak of.

Sirius was lost in thought when he saw someone drop a file on James's desk. He looked to see Theodora Donavan's face on the folder. Sirius felt all the blood in his body rush to his head so quickly he thought it might explode.

Sirius snatched the folder off of James's desk. "Why in the bloody hell do you have this file?" Sirius roared at James.

"Sirius calm down and hand me back that folder." James held out his hand, and then rubbed it over his face when he saw that Sirius wasn't handing anything over. "Okay, I know that you wanted this case Sirius but you have to be realistic. You barely have any field experience and the Donavan case is huge."

"It's not my fault I don't have any field experience. Mad Eye seems to think I'm some bumbling idiot that will screw everything up because he won't give me any cases."

James huffed and threw a quick glance at Mad Eye's office door, "I can talk to Mad Eye and see if I can get you on the cases. You can get some field experience and work a major case. If you don't screw anything up, Mad Eye will have to give you more cases."

"Okay, well go talk to him" Sirius motioned toward Mad Eye's office.

"I can't do it today Black. Don't be an idiot, if I ask on the first day I have the case he'll think I can't handle it and take it away from me." James said.

"He'll think that anyways. So go talk to him now" Sirius demanded.

"Maybe, but if I get some work done on the case before I ask he won't want to start the case over." James smiled at his own brilliance.

"Fine" Sirius huffed and handed the folder over. "But you have to ask him by the end of the week."

Sirius spend the rest of the day helping James with the case, unofficially of course. Although Sirius didn't want James to get all the credit for his work he knew that the faster they made a break the sooner he could be put on the case.

At the end of the day Sirius and James sighed with frustration they hadn't gotten any farther in the case. They knew nothing more than what was already in the file. James slid his chair back and stood up.

"That whole day was a waste" James said putting the file into his bag.

"Hold on just a minute" Sirius said to James, looking around. Sirius waited until everyone was out of the office. "Hand me the folder I want to duplicate it"

James pulled the file out of his bag with a quick glance around the room. Sirius pulled out his wand and duplicated the file. Sirius slipped the copy into his bag and James took the original.

"Got any hot plans for tonight?" James asked Sirius as they walked toward the fireplaces.

"I plan on grabbing something at Marty's pub and falling asleep with this." Sirius tapped his bag.

James let out a laugh, "I really don't understand you mate, you're young, and unattached. If I didn't have Lily, I would be out every night and all you ever do is sit at home."

"Bug off, James" Sirius said before stepping into the fireplace. He heard James laugh again before he was sucked up through the Floo network.