Chapter 88
Dreams
"How are we supposed to control our dreams?" Sirius heard James ask from the mirror. "Isn't that sort of the point of dreams, our subconscious telling us things our conscious doesn't know, or something?"
"It's an off branch of occlumency; there's also the muggle way of doing it, which is to think about what you want to dream about before you go to sleep, but that's pretty unreliable," Sirius replied, lounging on his red and gold colored bed while flipping through the pages of one of his books.
"You aren't actually suggesting we learn occlumency... are you? Solemnly Sirius, that's like past Auror level, that's like, Dumbledore level."
"Not quite that far, but yeah, I don't really think we could pull that off yet."
"Yet? Si, you do realize we don't have to learn every hard spell in the books don't you?"
Sirius rolled his eyes, not that James could see, the future-stag seemed to be avoiding eye contact.
"No, but it will be very useful. Sorta necessary if we're going to do this: we can't have people getting in our brains and finding out that we're animagi, or that Remus is a werewolf."
"Sirius, there are not enough people who use legilimency for that to be even remotely necessary," James countered.
"Says you. Half the people I know have training in legilimency, even if it's just a little."
"Are you solemn?"
"No, and will you stop using that word out of context!"
James ignored him. "There is no way we can do that, I mean... how... that's just bloody brilliant," James stammered, ending on a sarcastic note.
"Sorry, mate."
"There is no way we can do this right now, maybe in twenty years or so..."
"James, we'll figure it out, we always do. For now, we need to figure out how to complete the next step to turn me into a dog," Sirius said, putting the previous book away and opening a new one, without even moving from his comfortable spot.
"Please, Sirius, you turning into a dog is the last thing I'm worried about, you're already halfway there, it's me and Peter I'm worried about," James teased.
"Hilarious, James. Like I've never heard that one before."
"I know, I'm a comedic genius."
"I suppose our best option is to try the muggle way, but it couldn't hurt to research occlumency anyway, it's not like I have anything else to do for the next two months..." Sirius trailed off leaving the bed and pulling out a parchment with a book list on it. "The cool thing is occlumency is legal, so acquiring information on it would be the simplest part of the Animagi process."
"I'm glad that's easier, because actually learning it is impossible."
"Not impossible, there have been younger people to learn it."
"Who? Merlin?" James laughed, not actually believing Sirius.
"My great grandfather," Sirius replied simply, as though it was normal to have a grandfather who learned such high level spells at such a young age. "He had a particular talent with mind-manipulation magic, his favorite was the imperius curse."
"Brill," James said sarcastically.
"Hey, it isn't my fault they brainwashed me into knowing all this junk. Besides it was the only thing he was good at."
"Nope, but it is your fault for bringing it up."
"Sure, sure. So we just need to think about what we need to dream about before we go to sleep, hmm, it's worth a shot. Might as well try it out now, yeah?"
"You're just trying to get rid of me aren't you," James said with a laugh.
"Well considering you won't even look at me I think I have every right."
"Eh, I'll tell Peter," was James' only response before hanging up. Sirius gave the mirror an amused look and shook his head, his curiosity only increasing. No point in dwelling on that though, he needed to dream about his animagi.
It took three weeks for the three of them managed to dream of their animagi as they were required to. The dreams were always a hair shy of what they needed, which included having both themselves (in third person) and the animal they were to change into: the animal had to be exactly the one they saw with the potion, not even an eye could be a different colour; and the animal had to be in motion at least once throughout the dream.
James had been the first to manage; he'd found doodling the animal as he fell asleep had helped him dream of it, so Sirius and Peter had tried that and it did help, but it was nothing more than a relief when it was finally over. None of them were particularly excited to spend their entire break sleeping and they still hadn't planned their, as James had called it, annual school book shopping trip. Which was highly depressing in itself.
And so Remus was quickly contacted, with James putting in many excuses for his lack of letters as well. And it was decided that it would be on August 20th, Sirius' birthday, as it was guaranteed to be after they got their book lists, and James decided it was a crime for anyone to be alone on their birthday, even if Sirius considered it little more than a normal Tuesday.
It was an unusual birthday party, that's for sure. Between buying all of their school supplies and getting thrown out of the Leaky Cauldron it wasn't what normal people would consider a successful gathering.
Then again the Marauders were far from normal.
The hyena laughs heard throughout Diagon Alley were a bold testament to that.
"I cannot believe you got us kicked out. I'll never be able to look at Tom the same way again," Remus moaned, completely ignoring the fact that he was just as much at fault as they were.
James and Sirius' responses consisted solely of giggles.
"Well it's safe to say that he'll never forget us, at least." Remus shook his head, his friends' antics amused him to no end. He'd been worried he would drag them down, what with the full moon having been only a few days ago and him having been unable to sleep all week.
He'd forgotten just how good they were at cheering him up. It was silly, sure, but nearly two months away had been enough for him to forget.
He loved his mother and father, but his friendship with the Marauders was a different, almost indescribable, comfort. Where his parents had given him comfort and helped him grow as an individual, his friends had done so socially.
A/N) Hi everyone. ^_^ Happy Thanksgiving (for all of you who celebrate Thanksgiving) And Happy er... Tomorrow for all of you who don't. Gotta feel bad for you, I get lots of food and get to see all my family. But alas, not everyone can be so luck. lol Nevermind, I'm sure there's lots of things y'all do that I don't get to do.
Top ten Marauders pet peeves,
10. Sirius using serious puns, or copious amounts of said puns
9. Marauder's falling in love with Lily's imaginary friends,
8. Any of the Marauders dating Lily
7. James dating anyone! but Lily.
6. Sirius' dad drunk/lazy/out of the job/ cliche abusive
5. James or Sirius being complete idiots
4. Peter being magically transformed into someone else
3. Remus turning into Hermione
As in his characterization. A lot of times when you read and Marauder fanfic Remus seems to be bossy (though not overly so), overly concerned with the rules, an over-exagerated bookworm (and that's saying a lot as I'm a bookworm myself), and just decidedly not Remus. I see this one a lot, that's why I do my best to characterize Remus completely different. He is still a rule-breaker, he just feels guilty about it sometimes. He isn't a bookworm he just knows where the best information is stored (and doesn't have access to the internet.) And his isn't bossy. That one is the single most important one of all. Hermione-Remus would not have hesitated to tell Dumbledore that Sirius was getting into the castle with his Animagus ability. Hermione-Remus would not have returned the Marauder's map to Harry at the end of third year. Hermione-Remus would not have sat there and ignored it when his best friends were bullying Snape. Remus is completely different from Hermione.
I'm not saying Hermione is a bad character, she isn't at all. She isn't one of my favorites, but she is a great character. However, Remus is not Hermione. Hermione was much braver and smarter then Remus.
Hermione sticks up for and to her friends. Remus could never do the later, it's (as Rowling has stated) his greatest flaw. He likes to be liked so much that he won't do anything to jeopardize his relationship with his friends. Including tell them off for their pranks.
And really would Hermione lodge a piece of gum into Peeve's nose on her first day of teaching? No, no she wouldn't.
This is probably the second most common on my top ten list, only the first is more. And it drives me crazy!
Edit: 1/9/14 Fixed name of the Leaky Cauldron... I accidently wrote the Prancing Pony. ^_^ lol