The wet leaves beneath his feet hardly make a sound as he tries to pick his way carefully over the twigs and branches that littered the forest floor. Everything is damp and cold, and the air is so crisp it stings his exposed skin. All he managed to find this morning after the transformation were his pants. Everything else was either stolen or ripped to shreds.
He is distracted by the sight of his own breath coming out in quick and uneven gasps.
"Shh!", he thinks to himself. "For God sakes you will ruin everything. "
He tries so hard to be stealthy. He mustn't be followed or seen away from the pack. But he stumbles and lands on one knee. He is so weak. He holds onto the wound in his side tightly and tries to ignore the pain. But even the blood is beginning to freeze and he knows he wont make it much farther.
He knows the portkey is near. But it may as well be on the other side of the world.
He hangs his head and coughs. He tries to stifle the sound of them, but soon he can hardly breathe. He tries desperately to hold them in, but he feels like a man drowning; whose instincts tell him to breathe though his mind tells him it will mean the end. He lets himself go and after a long fit, feels blood drip from his mouth.
He knows he is going to die.
And suddenly the thought makes him angrier than he has felt in a long time. After everything he's been through. And everything he's seen. He was going to die on his knees in the forest hiding and alone.
He's not afraid to die. But the marauder in him balks at the thought of going out like this. He can almost hear Sirius's voice telling him to man up and find the portkey. He should be going down fighting damnit.
It shouldn't be like this…..
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She paces nervously outside her station in Hogsmead. She is bundled up from head to toe. She is still so cold that her teeth chatters. She is too distracted to even think of a warming charm. Because Remus checks in with Dumbledore every month after the full moon.
But he has not made it.
She finds it terrible awkward that she was given the task of giving him supplies. And every month he uses her fireplace to talk to Albus. It's an awfully convenient arrangement for the two men. Albus is able to be near if he is needed, but will not have to be seen in Hogsmead when it isn't necessary. She couldn't exactly voice her complaints about the arrangement. It seemed so childish in the face of everything.
In the last few months (since Christmas to be exact) she has avoided seeing him. Its far too painful. For the both of them. So she leaves his supplies in her room and then she watches from afar as he portkeys into the back alley, and once she is sure he was ok, she leaves him to his business.
Something was wrong today though. Because, although on many occasions he voiced his doubt over making every one of them, he has never actually missed a portkey. Since the risk of using a portkey more than once a month was too high, it was of utmost importance that he make them. If he didn't make it, then he would be out of the loop with the order, he wouldn't be able to pass on information to Albus, and his supplies would be non existent.
She paced feverishly back and forth. She tried not to think about him in the cold. She tried to block images of him hurt from her mind. She knows how hard the transformations are for him in the wild. Without wolfs bane, it is torturous. He always comes back injured, but his wand is in her room for safe keeping, and he is especially good with healing spells.
Where is he? She whispers out loud quietly yet desperately. She finally decides to contact Albus herself to tell him what's wrong when Remus suddenly appeared before her eyes.
She gasped and held in a shriek. He was dead. She knew it. He was dead. She was frozen still for several seconds, eyes wide in shock, before her training kicked in. She was quickly on her knees, wand out and ready.
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He wakes up slowly to a comfortable warmth surrounding him. His eyes are still closed and he feels a bright ray of light on the other side of his eyelids. He feels as if he's floating comfortably. He hasn't felt this good in a very long time.
He supposes he's died. So this is the afterlife? His heart leaps at the thought of seeing James, Lilly, and Sirius again. He feels so happy. Why can't he open his eyes though? He hasn't been able to move yet.
He feels somewhat absurd. He can already imagine James and Sirius laughing at him for mucking up his ascent into Heaven. Just laying there like a bump on a log, while they wait for his greeting.
Sirius's death had still been so recent. It had still been so fresh. How he missed spending evenings with him and Nymphadora. Nymphadora.
Oh God. He thinks. A panicked feeling spreads throughout his chest. He left her. He spares a thought to the fact that he should feel such sorrow in Heaven. He was always under the impression that Heaven was devoid of that sort of thing. He feels a sob welling up in side of him, though he was still floating comfortably. A small moan escaped his throat and he saw a shadow pass over his eyes and block the bright light.
With all his might he managed to open one eye slowly, not knowing what he would see in the afterlife.
As his eyesight cleared he saw two very bright blue eye twinkling underneath a pair of wire rimmed eyeglasses looking back at him very closely. He saw a very crooked nose, and a very big smile.
He laughed out loud. Which made him cough quite violently. Madame Pompfrey was over in a heartbeat making him swallow a sleeping potion. He continued to chuckle softly as he began to drift back off. "Heaven", he thought as the potion made him feel like he was floating again. "Hilarious." But then he caught a glimpse of her sitting on the other side of the bed right before he went under. His heart swelled in his chest. Maybe he wasn't wrong.