Remus was beginning to regret his decision to step out of the pub "for a breath of air." Muggle beer was stronger than butterbeer, so he'd gone outside to avoid temptation. The Veritas Curse was hard enough to work around when he was sober. Drunk, there was no telling what he might say. His nose was keener than a normal human's. The alley - at least to him - stank of tobacco and beer ... and other liquids best left unnamed. Four of the Blue Blaze Irregulars who were acting as roadies and back up musicians had come into the alley behind the pub have a fag. Buckaroo didn't approve of cigarettes, so they tried not to smoke in front of him.

"Those three in a row, I know that's Orion," said the big, beefy blond who called himself Jolly Jack Tar. "And I could find the Plough and Cassiopeia when I was a boy, but I've forgotten most of what I used to know about the stars."

"That's the Plough." Remus pointed to the constellation Americans called the Big Dipper. "You can't see the stars properly in London. The lights of the city drown them out."

"Light pollution," Gorilla Carroll said in a thick Jamaican accent. He was a big Black man who played a cello nearly his own size, and looked quite capable of bench-pressing a Range Rover.

"You an astronomer, Lupin?" asked Osprey McCarthy. The violinist took a long drag on his cigarette and blew out a mouthful of smoke.

Remus shook his head. "Just a hobby."

"Just like the flute, eh?" Fezziwig asked. He was short and round, but a genius with the light and sound board. If he had a name other than Fezziwig, Remus hadn't heard it yet.

Remus nodded.

"Any real job, or just a lot of hobbies?" Fezziwig asked.

"I'm between positions at the moment," Remus confessed. "What about you? Are you employed by Dr. Banzai or just hanging around until you find a position, or what?"

"I'm a solicitor," Gorilla said. "This is my fortnight holiday, hanging out with Buckaroo and the Cavaliers."

"I'm working on my Ph. D.," Jolly Jack Tar explained. "I'm collecting folk songs, especially old ones that show linguistic variations of regional dialects."

Remus raised one eyebrow. "So you hang out with a rock star?"

"It's like Louis Armstrong said: 'all music is folk music - ain't no music for horses'," Jolly Jack Tar misquoted. The others chuckled, and he continued, "Buckaroo is interested in all types of music."

Remus nodded, remembering his "audition" the day before.

"Fez and I are on holiday, too," Osprey added. "He works for Auntie Beeb; I'm a sales clerk at Harrod's."

"Now, then, if you're going to be hanging around with us, what shall we call you?" Jolly Jack Tar wondered aloud.

Remus gave him a confused look.

"Mrs. Carruthers didn't name our Yank friend Pinky, nor did my mother tell the vicar to christen me Jolly Jack Tar," the blond pointed out.

Osprey chuckled. "He's Lord Jonathan Carrington-Charleton when he's at home, and the younger son of the Marquess of Charleton when he isn't playing roadie for the Hong Kong Cavaliers. "

"Tattletale," Jolly Jack Tar announced.

"At school my nickname was Moony," Remus admitted.

"Because of the astronomy?" Gorilla asked.

"In part." He hesitated a moment. "I was wild in my youth - howl-at-the-moon wild."

"Then you're in good company. We're all a little wild," Gorilla bragged.

"Shall we go in and have another pint?" Remus suggested. He desperately wanted to change the subject before they asked him questions he couldn't - or at least shouldn't - answer.

After a week of sightseeing and rehearsing by day, and performing by night, the Hong Kong Cavaliers left London. Remus went with them. Three nights in Kent, a different town and a different pub each night. Two nights in Surrey. Then they went to Berkshire, where Buckaroo declared a vacation - Remus and the British Blue Blaze Irregulars teased him that he meant a holiday - and he rented a farm in Lambourn. Every day they rode, every single one of them, from the roadies to the rock stars. They rehearsed in the morning: jazz, folk, rock, soul, classical. In the afternoons Buckaroo visited the Bronze Age barrows with an archaeologist friend whilst Rawhide and Reno organized an impromptu training class for the local Blue Blaze Irregulars: physical training (running, riding, calisthenics, obstacle courses), problem solving, and foreign languages. Some evenings, they performed at local pubs, other evenings, they sat on the grass at the farm, observing the stars, drinking fermented yak's milk, twenty-year-old Scotch, and lemon shandy, discussing Søren Kierkegaard and Ioanna Kuçuradi, Gottfried von Leibniz and Ada Lovelace.

Remus found it fascinating. It was very different from Hogwarts, and yet reminded him of his time with the Marauders. Many of the Blue Blaze Irregulars were as fond of practical jokes as the Marauders had been, and for Muggles, were ingeniously clever about them. Remus had gotten an Outstanding on his Astronomy N.E.W.T., and found a kindred soul in Rawhide when it came to stargazing. Fluent in French and Latin, he helped tutor those language classes, whilst studying German and Italian. The physical training reminded him of the Auror's training he'd heard his friends discuss, for which he'd been unable to apply. Certainly his time in the Order of the Phoenix might have been easier if he'd had training like this then.

For the first time since James and Lily Potter had died, Remus felt like he belonged again.

"Jikkō, Charlemagne, jikkō," Buckaroo urged his horse.

Reno on his dapple-gray and Remus on his strawberry-roan raced after him, but it took them a while to catch up. Buckaroo had learned to ride almost as soon as he had learned to walk, and Charlemagne was a former Grand National winner, now retired to stud duty.

"What was that you were saying before?" Remus asked when the three of them stopped to rest their horses. "Jikkó?"

"Jikkō," Buckaroo corrected his pronunciation. "Japanese for run. I speak Spanish to God, French to women, English to men, and Japanese to my horse."

Remus smiled. He glanced down the hill and saw a half-dozen horses grazing in the meadow. It was good to be on a horse again; he hadn't been in the saddle since he'd left Hogwarts. He and the other Marauders had gone straight from school to joining Dumbledore in his fight against He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named.

He couldn't help thinking of James and Lily. James had taught him how to ride. James had looked forward to Harry on his first pony as much as he had his first broom. Remus wondered what happened to the Potter estate: had solicitors hired stewards to look after the land, the golden fields of barley, the green pastures, the flocks of sheep, the stable full of horses? Would the steward be willing to hire a werewolf? Or had everything been sold and the money put in Gringotts to wait for Harry to come of age? He lost his smile thinking of poor, orphaned Harry.

"You okay?" Buckaroo asked.

"What?" The question startled Remus; his mind had been wandering like an off-course broom.

"At the Banzai Institute, we have the Three Bs," Buckaroo explained. "The Bus, the Bath, and the Bed. That's where the greatest discoveries are made in science."

"When you're at your most relaxed, your most receptive, that's when ideas pop into your head like a bullet." Reno suggested, "Maybe we should add a fourth B, back of a horse."

"You looked like you were engrossed in deep, serious thoughts. Are you okay?" Buckaroo repeated.

"Just remembering the friend who taught me to ride," Remus confessed. "His family had a place in Wiltshire, not far from Stonehenge. He's dead now, he and his wife, and I miss them both."

"How did they die?" Reno asked.

"They were murdered. Betrayed by someone they trusted, someone they thought was a friend. Someone I thought was a friend." To this day, he couldn't understand how Sirius could have betrayed them to Voldemort. He'd wanted to go to Azkaban and ask him, but Black wasn't permitted visitors.

"A man who trusts can never be betrayed, only mistaken," Buckaroo quoted. He fell silent for a moment. "My wife was murdered. The people we love are never truly gone, as long as we remember them."

"From the time I was eleven, he was one of my best friends. And she was like a sister to me. They will never be forgotten," Remus said, his voice barely above a whisper.

"Then they will never truly die," Buckaroo assured him.

That night, after most of the Irregulars had gone to bed, Buckaroo gathered Rawhide, Perfect Tommy, and Reno in the barn. "What do you think of the new guy?"

"He's hiding something," Rawhide said immediately.

"What?" Buckaroo inhaled, enjoying the sweet smell of the fresh hay.

"I called Billy Travers," Perfect Tommy reported. Billy was a sixteen year old computer hacker, an intern at the Banzai Institute back in New Jersey. He'd been offered a job at the National Security Agency when he was only fourteen years old. "Billy says there's nothing. No birth certificate, no school records, no driver's license."

Reno nodded. "False name." Not having been born Reno Nevada, the slender dark-haired man was no stranger to aliases. None of them were. Of the Hong Kong Cavaliers, only Buckaroo Banzai used his real name.

"He hardly ever answers right away; he almost always thinks first before he speaks," Rawhide added.

"Not a bad thing, in and of itself," Buckaroo noted. "Too damned many people speak without thinking at all.

"True enough," Rawhide agreed, "but Remus always thinks first, like he's measuring his words before he uses them."

Buckaroo nodded; that matched his own observations. "Strengths? Weaknesses?"

"Good naked-eye astronomer, but almost totally ignorant of astrophysics," Rawhide said.

"Fluent in French, with a Bordeaux accent," Perfect Tommy reported. "Fluent in Latin, both spoken and written. Learning Italian quickly, learning German slowly. Helps the others with their language lessons. Seems to have a knack for both languages and teaching."

"In good shape physically, but obviously hasn't had any training like this before," Reno added. "Doing well for a newbie."

"Good on a horse," Rawhide added.

"Takes a practical joke with a smile, then gives as good as he gets." Reno reached for the leather wineskin, full of fermented yak's milk, and drank deeply.

"Good flutist," Rawhide said.

"Flautist," Perfect Tommy corrected automatically. Americans said flutists. The English said flautist or flute-player, and they were in England.

"Does anyone know what he does he do for a living when he's not a janitor? What his hobbies are beyond playing a bone flute? Where was he educated? What did he study?" Buckaroo asked.

The other three shook their heads.

"I like him," Buckaroo announced. "Do we recruit him?"

"For the Blue Blaze Irregulars, definitely. As an intern for the Institute, no, not yet," Rawhide advised. He didn't even suggest the possibility of Remus joining the Hong Kong Cavaliers.

"Too many unanswered questions," Reno agreed.

"The only way to know if a man is trustworthy," Buckaroo began.

"Is to trust him," all four said in unison.

He went on to the next potential candidate. "What about Alice Tremayne?"

"Comet? Good musician, good biochemist." Rawhide turned to Reno and looked pointedly at the wineskin. Reno passed it over to him.

to be continued

Author's Note: Søren Kierkegaard (1813 - 1855), Danish philosopher, Ioanna Kuçuradi (born 1936), Turkish philosopher, Gottfried von Leibniz (1646 - 1716), German mathematician, Ada Lovelace (1815 - 1852), English mathematician.