Title: Operation Remus Lupin (and the Consequences of Celia Vane's Other Intelligent Endeavours)
Pairing: Sirius/Remus
Warnings/Disclaimer: Refer to chapter one.
Author's Note: Thanks so much for the reviews! Please keep writing them, it means a lot to me to know what you're thinking!

-

The dormitory is the same one the girls had when they were eleven, nervous and bashful and a whole lot tidier than they are now. But with being a seventh year comes a few useful perks, including an expansion charm and all the more room for the girls sharing the dormitory to spread their rubbish. Most of them, Celia included, their own full-length mirrors. They also have a painting that looks like something classic, but isn't, and several lounge chairs. Unfortunately said chairs are too cluttered by books, junk food, half-finished essays, and letters from home to actually be of use to anyone who doesn't want to spend quite a few hours clearing them off.

So when the hastily-planned meeting finally comes around on a cold and rainy night, everyone finds her own place to sit. Agatha chews her nails. Deborah sits with her legs crossed, her right foot jiggling back and forth with impatience (or possibly boredom). They are seated on Celia's bed, along with the other chief club members, Bertha, Agnes, and Glenda (who won't let anyone sit on their beds), while the younger girls are cramp together on the carpet.

Each and every one of them is looking at Celia.

"So," she says, unfolding an unnecessary list and feeling very superior from her own separate space in the middle of the room, "Welcome back to school, right?"

Silence. Some nameless first year sneezes, and the few girls next to her edge slowly away. Everyone else continues staring at Celia expectantly. Maybe a bit warily.

She blinks back at them and sighs.

Oh, what the hell?

"Right," she snaps, ruthlessly crumbling the parchment and tossing it to the floor, "Bertha, where are my Ravenclaws? Did they get the owls or not?" Celia turns to pace back and forth across the dorm, kicking magazines and spare clothing out of her path as she walks (although she resists striking the faces of first years, wide-eyed and trembling).

"Well - I'm not really sure. That Bagshott girl said she had to talk to Mafalda…And someone else, Rita I think, said they thought they were coming, but they didn't know for sure because…something or other…" Bertha trails off hopelessly, avoiding Celia's eyes.

Before Celia can retort, Deborah makes a huffing sound that somehow breaks the brief spell of awkwardness. "Well Bertha, since you kind of made yourself in charge of gathering everyone here, I don't see why you can't at least do it right."

"God! Can no one just answer Celia's question?" Glenda interjects. Celia's too busy glaring icily at Bertha to look up, but her whiney tone is unmistakable.

"Why don't you shut up?"

"Why don't you shut up?"

This is typical for the majority of the Sirius Black meetings. There's always something to bicker about, whether it's who's responsible for what, who should go on the best Stalks, or simply who's a whore and who isn't. Generally, sides are quickly taken over their usual concerns, and the sixth and seventh years end up arguing for the greater half of the hour while the younger girls sit around looking like they want to kill themselves. Celia loves every minute of it.

But finally, Agatha silences them all. She's good at this. Celia sometimes suspects that Agatha might actually be the only one of them with an ounce of intelligence - besides herself, of course. But perhaps Agatha being Celia's closest friend and the club's vice president has something to do with that opinion.

"We don't need the Ravenclaws right now. I'll send them an owl with some notes." Agatha's clipboard is already ready. Celia beams back at her, but Glenda glares resentfully at her lap and nastily mumbles something to Agnes that Celia doesn't catch (Agatha does, however, and her smile fades a bit).

Celia is pleased. They've settled down much more rapidly than usual, which means they might get something done - for once. "Alright, so, I have a new idea for this year," she finally continues, tossing her hair carelessly over her shoulder, "But I'm not sure how well it will work. We'll need a lot of research…involving, you know, undercover investigations. And such." She's lowering her voice, which doesn't exactly make sense because they already soundproofed the room. But every girl's head leans closer anyway, eyes shining with interest, mouths shaping into little o's.

She has their full attention now.

Celia takes a deep breath and is surprised to feel it shaking with something like nervousness. This is, after all, a big step for the club. If the other girls don't like the idea, all of Celia's planning will go to waste. Plus, she'll feel quite stupid. Celia Vane does not like feeling stupid. She clears her throat twice before continuing.

"With that Remus Lupin fellow, you know. I think we can use him to get information about Sirius. I mean, we've asked him basic questions before, but he always just sort of avoided them, probably because we didn't know him. You know? We have to befriend him this time.

"And I was thinking, well, if we really get to know Remus' personality, we could er. Polyjuice him or something? It might be a bit difficult. Which is why we needed the Ravenclaws. Anyway, that way we could talk to Sirius like one of his friends. It could open up a brand new set of possibilities."

The room is filled with a thoughtful silence. Even Deborah's foot has stopped jiggling.

"But wouldn't Peter be easier to manipulate?" Agatha wonders, pausing in her furious scrawling.

"He would be, but he doesn't spend much one-on-one time with Sirius. You know? We'll definitely have to try if Operation Remus doesn't work out, though." Celia is quite satisfied with the reaction, and soon, her breathing returns to normal. Operation Remus. It's already got capital letters in her head. It already has promise.

"I'll look up some of the books he's reading for you, Celia," Agnes says helpfully.

"Yeah. And we'll try to get a tutoring session booked, too. He does that, right? For Defence?"

It's actually going to happen. Celia can barely contain her excitement, and she has to run her fingers through her glossy hair several times to keep herself from squealing.

She almost misses it when someone makes a comment that stills the room into stony silence:

"Wait. Why Remus? Why not James?"

The room is quiet. Rain continues to pound against the windows in heavy sheets. Thunder cackles in the distance.

"James?" Celia hisses, her head snapping to glare at the speaker. It's a fourth year, no wonder. Or a third year, possibly? "James?" she repeats. Other members of the club start making similar noises of distress.

"…Well, he's Sirius' best mate, right? If we-"

Celia breathes in, breathes out. Tries to calm herself down. Again. "Darling," she says, slowly, condescendingly (but she can't help it if she doesn't know the girl's name), "the James Potter Fan Club is no longer made up of our allies, and therefore-"

"They're all pretty much sluts," Glenda interrupts.

"- therefore we cannot expect them to recognise our mission without…without interference. And anyway, James is too stupid to even attempt to imitate; that may turn out to be part of the plan. With Remus all we'd have to do is say some big words now and then. Generally we can just be quiet and, you know, flip through some book or something. It'll be easy."

"I was thinking I could try talking to him first, you know," she adds, when the younger girl has finally realised that it's wiser just to keep her mouth shut, "And if it works out someone else could give it a try. So. Any questions?"

"You'll be great, Celia," Glenda coos. Everyone ignores her.

"Right. I'll owl you all the next time I've made some progress, and we'll have another meeting. Agatha, work on those Ravenclaws. Bertha, start planning the bake sale. Oh and Deborah, pass around the Stalking schedule - I can't deal with any of you anymore."

And with all of her usual flair, Celia stands up and leaves the room before Glenda can follow her with lavish compliments. She bites back her smile until the door is closed firmly behind her.

That had gone surprisingly well.

-

Celia has never been very good at note-taking.

So far she has:

sleepy
careful
intelligent
"tortured artist" ("poetic", maybe?)
approachable, yet distances himself (what?)
only seems truly comfortable within his group of "Marauders"

It isn't all that much, and it isn't like it isn't anything she didn't already know. With Sirius it isn't so hard, because all she has to do is go on about flawless biceps and perfect hair for about an hour while angrily wishing that his friends would just get out of the way. But Remus, she's beginning to learn, is difficult. He isn't particularly outstanding. Brown hair, brown eyes. Numerous scars, the two most obvious across his nose and jaw bone. He seems a bit on the short side, but then again, that could just be in comparison to Sirius, who is clearly a model of male stature.

Celia pries her eyes away from Sirius to again study Remus, who is seated with his usual friends in their usual corner of the library.

Remus likes to read. He seems to enjoy homework. Using a few dependable connections, she's also found out that his love life is practically non-existent.

Frankly, he seems a bit boring. From the opposite side of the room it's hard to tell what he's even doing. Besides studying. She wonders if she could slip by the group and pretend to get a book.

Because slowly strolling by groups of gentlemen "to get a book" is one of her specialties, the next thing she knows, Celia is pressed behind the bookshelf adjacent to them and stealthily listening in on the conversation as she "scans the shelves".

Unfortunately, Remus isn't much more interesting to listen to than he is to than he is to look at. He and his friends continue to study for the upcoming History of Magic exam. Well, Remus is studying, at least. James might be working a bit, but it's painfully obvious, even from the other side of the room, that he's more interested gaining the attention of a certain redhead (who Celia isn't actually too fond of, as she's part of that annoying group of girls who seem to think they're more intelligent than the rest of the world) at the table beside them. Sirius doesn't seem to really care, and Peter is nearly hyperventilating as he urgently flips through the dusty pages.

"…have to know about that troll woman getting beheaded?" He's asking, nearly every word accompanied by a fluttering of paper.

"Possibly. I think you're thinking of the goblin, though. In 1537?" Remus reminds him patiently, although it sounds like they've been over this several times already. The test is tomorrow.

"I'm going to die," Peter moans.

"Hm? Bugger," says James brightly. Another page turns.

"Who cares if a woman gets beheaded if she's a bloody goblin?" Sirius. Celia wishes she had her quill and parchment so that she could write all of his words down.

But this isn't a Sirius Stalk. This is a Getting to Know Remus…Outing. First, she has to determine the best strategy of approaching him. Just so that she doesn't end up sounding completely stupid when she tries to bond with him over similar interests she hasn't actually discovered they had yet.

"She was a queen, too," Remus points out, but his words seem to go unheard by everyone but Celia, because James seems to have suddenly decided that history is not what they should be talking about at all.

"Yes, women are important, Moony. Are you two going to help plan that autumn festival with us? Before the Quidditch match?"

What autumn festival? Celia hasn't heard anything about an autumn festival - although she assumes the question is directed towards Peter and Remus.

"What autumn festival?" asks Peter.

"It's going to be great. A bonfire. And Firewhiskey. Oh yeah, costumes too, or something. The girls are planning that."

"Hey, yeah, but that was scheduled for the twenty-second," Sirius says, and his voice emphasises these last few words as if they're important. His voice lowers a bit, and Celia doesn't catch the next thing he says - but it sounds something like "in bloom". "He already won't see the match."

"It'll probably be fine by then," Remus says, lowering his own voice. His tone is strange: half apology, half defiance.

"Probably."

"We can always change the date, Sirius," James says quickly, "Just as long as there are dates involved. And not the kind you eat, either."

This is another reason the James Potter fan club is deranged. Who could possibly swoon over blokes who make such terrible puns? What kind of sense of humour did they have, anyway? But the other three boys don't even seem to notice (except for Peter, who chuckles mechanically). Maybe they're all just used to it.

"It's a lost cause, mate," says Sirius. There is a scraping of chairs, but it must not be from their table, because Sirius keeps talking. "It's going to be a bit difficult for you to keep chasing after Evans when you're responsible for half of the drinks."

"But it's supposed to be that kind of event. Apparently there used to be a ball all the seventh years went to, but they stopped having it because everyone kept sneaking off to get pissed and shag each other," James argues.

"Then they had the right idea. No one plans these kinds of things ahead."

"Well, you could always ask that blonde girl to go with you," Remus offers hesitantly. "She just went behind that bookshelf."

Celia instinctively leaps backwards, yanking The Encyclopaedia of Fairies from the shelf. Getting caught eavesdropping is the last thing she needs right now. She clutches the heavy volume to her chest, holding her breath.

Suddenly, part of her really hates Remus. And part of her absolutely adores him.

"Maybe I will," Sirius says, but he doesn't move, and there's a strange, awkward shuffling of papers on the other side of the shelf.

"Well, I'm going to go ask Professor Binns about that beheading question. I'll meet up with you all later." It's Remus, and he's mumbling. She hears his chair slide away from the table and the sound of a book falling closed.

James gives a half-hearted au revoir. Peter must be too busy cramming to even notice that he's leaving. Sirius is oddly silent. Celia decides to stay and listen to just the three of them for a bit, to see if anything happens. If anyone, particularly a certain someone, decides to come over to talk to her.

But nothing does happen, so she eventually flounces back to her seat (being sure to walk very slowly). She sits there until the bell rings to signal the end of the study period, but Sirius never even looks her way.