Chapter 154

Another Name

"Is this my shirt?" James asked lifting up a black tee with a cartoon character on it. Peter was fairly sure that they'd all worn it at some point.

"I think Peter got that for Sirius for Christmas a while ago." Remus turned to Peter who thought about it. He vaguely remembered buying it but who did he buy it for? Certainly not himself.

"Ah well, it doesn't really matter." James shrugged it off and stuffed it into his overnight bag.

"Why are you packing already?" Sirius turned to him looking extremely bored. "Christmas break isn't for like a week."

James shrugged throwing his underused comb into the bag, "got nothing better to do."

"Your history homework's done then?" Remus asked, knowing full well it wasn't as they'd only received it a few hours ago.

"I said nothing better, Moony."

"Oh, of course, because how could homework be more important than packing stuff to take home for Christmas when you're inevitably going to repack it three times in the next week anyway." Remus rolled his eyes causing Peter to snicker at the truth of it.

"Everything is more important than history homework," Sirius added agreeing with James but not quite willing to start packing himself. "And since you won't let me go pick on some of the first years packing for Christmas might be the only thing worth doing," he grumbled sounding more put out than Peter really thought he had the right to be.

"If you get in trouble so will I and then she'll take my badge," James explained for the millionth time, a longing look on his face. Peter went back to his own homework, he could quote Sirius' next line, and James' response, if he wanted to.

"When do I ever get you in trouble?" Sirius barked his stony eyes glaring at James. Peter shivered, though the gaze wasn't directed at him.

"All the bloody time." James didn't even acknowledge the growl that Peter was sure would have most people hiding behind their four-poster bed.

Sirius gave a loud dramatic groan, "but I'm bored! You weren't bothered when we hexed Snively the other day."

"Nobody cares when we hex Snape or the Slytherins, it's everyone else they get mad about," James explained. Remus and Peter shared annoyed looks but neither said anything not wanting to start a fight.

Sirius had no such aversion, "no you just can't stop hexing Snape because you're jealous that Evans spends so much time with a dark arts-loving slimeball but it's you she's disgusted by."

There was a loud crack and Peter wasn't sure if James had thrown something at Sirius and missed, or just in a random direction, judging by the fact that James was a chaser though Wormtail guessed the latter. Sirius didn't even flinch to Peter's astoundment.

"I am not jealous," James seethed his full attention now on the hound who barely bothered to acknowledge his fury.

"Sounds to me like I touched a nerve," Sirius said perfectly calmly even grinning. James moved to retaliate, no doubt regretting his hesitation in actually throwing something at Sirius.

"All right, all right." Remus abandoned his book and walked over in between the two five-year-olds. "I have an idea of something we can do," he said as though that was why he was interrupting their argument so they didn't get angry at him too.

"I…" James started emphasizing the word, "found something to do on my own rather than sit there and demand to be entertained." Sirus didn't rise to the bait as Peter expected too and instead looked at Remus curiously so Remus continued as though uninterrupted.

"I was reading a book…"

"Big surprise there," Sirius muttered under his breath, Remus just smiled and went on.

"And it mentioned the imperius curse. So I thought I'd look up more information on it since I don't know much about it."

"You could have just asked." Sirius interrupted but again Remus ignored him.

"The book said it's possible to fight it," he looked at the two meaningfully.

"You think we should learn how to fight the imperius curse," James concluded sitting back down, argument and overnight bag forgotten.

"That's not something you can do from a book, Moony. You have to experience it." Sirius sat up, eyes narrowing slightly in James' direction as though he had the suspicion James was going to be a problem, Peter figured he was probably right. "I'm sure I can cast the spell on you lot, I've never done it before but I know the theory behind it, but I can't exactly cast it on myself…"

"No," James interrupted, his face stern almost angry. Sirius turned to him, not in the least surprised by the venom in his voice. Peter sighed to himself waiting for James to go on one of his anti-dark arts rants.

"You don't have to learn it, James. I'm sure I can manage to…" Remus tried but James shook his head and interrupted once again.

"That's dark magic, like serious dark magic. People go to Azkaban just for casting it, you don't need any more reason for anyone to misjudge you. Besides you read that book Svallin had us read last year, you know what that stuff does to your soul."

"I think my soul can tell the difference between using the spell to help someone and using it to hurt them, Prongs."

"You can't tell him what to do, anyway. If he thinks it's a good idea it's got nothing to do with you." Sirius added sounding irritable, as though ready to start the fight back up again.

"You already have enough trouble stopping yourself using them to hurt others, you don't need to be using them regularly." James turned on Sirius.

"You know that's not his fault," Remus defended, starting to sound angry now, "and that's a result of upbringing, not the magic itself."

"Doesn't mean we should encourage it!"

"I'm not encouraging anything. Do you really think our first experience with the curse should be when the death eaters are using it on us? One of us has already been threatened with it, and frankly, I don't think it's a good idea to let Sirius' mum have that much power over him, and by extension us. I don't trust that woman to keep her word when she promises to not use it on him if his grades go up, and I know you don't either. Next year Sirius could come back to school under the imperius curse and we'd have no idea. You really want to risk something like that?" Remus reasoned and Peter turned back to the conversation, the idea was frightening. As if Sirius wasn't scary enough of his own accord Peter didn't want to consider the idea that Sirius could be under his mother's control and living in the same room as him. James hesitated, trying desperately to find an argument for Remus' cold hard logic and Peter was impressed when it appeared he couldn't find one. "Like I said, you don't have to do it if you don't feel comfortable with it, Prongs. I'm sure I can learn eventually and we only really need two people to learn it."

"I don't like it," James said shaking his head.

"It's better than the alternative," Remus tried to give him a reassuring smile but he wasn't looking anymore.

"I'd be able to learn it faster and the faster we get it over with the better I'll feel," James said his gaze pointedly on his pillow. Peter's mouth dropped, did James just volunteer to do dark magic? Was it so that Remus didn't have to? Did he think the werewolf's soul was more fragile, perhaps? Or was it just out of care for Remus? The James Peter had thought he knew would never have done it, not for anyone. But here he was volunteering so that Remus didn't have to spend days upon days casting illegal dark magic that James thought could potentially damage his soul. This was a side of James that Peter was still unused to seeing despite both Sirius and Remus acting as triggers for it. It was odd how the werewolf seemed to bring out both James and Sirius' softer protective side without even trying.

"That's true," Remus nodded, "but I don't mind really if it bothers you."

"It's better if I do it."

"Yeah, it'll probably take you like five minutes where it would take Remus a week," Sirius teased grinning finally.

But it didn't take James five minutes. While Sirius got it on his first try, happily making James declare his undying love for an amused Remus, James couldn't quite get it to work. As far as Peter, who had taught himself to cast the curse the previous summer but wasn't about to admit it to them, could tell he was doing everything right. He complained about a chill that came over him every time he tried. Peter didn't know what that meant and would have assumed it was a mental hesitation if Sirius hadn't commented that he'd have to push past that to cast the curse, meaning it was something legitimate that Peter hadn't felt.

Between that, studying up on the theory of resisting the imperius curse (so they'd be a little prepared at least) and the homework the meaner teachers were still assigning to them this close to break, the last week of term went by quickly and before he knew it Peter was running around the dorm collecting his scattered belongings before the train left, Remus scolding him for waiting so long and James chuckling at him.

They found an empty compartment for themselves immediately, not wanting anyone to attempt to invade. James and Sirius chatted away about what they were going to do over the holiday - Sirius excited at the prospect of going to James' place again - Remus continued his book - commenting on James and Sirius' conversation every once in a while- and Peter decided on a nap -having woken far too early to get started packing his take home bag.

He'd barely dozed off when he was awakened by sounds of a fight coming from the next compartment over. Words were indistinguishable but it was enough to annoy the four of them.

"I should hex them," Sirius said irritably glaring at the wall.

"No teachers around, maybe we could," James added thoughtfully. Peter knew that James was starting to get a little high strung as a result of the loss of his favorite stress relieving outlet.

"They're not hurting you, besides we have more important things to worry about, there's a full moon on Wednesday." Remus' distraction was adequate for a while, as they began to plan things ranging from sneaking into Remus' house in the middle of the night to fake birthday parties for an excuse to be with him on the full moon until the sounds next door escalated dramatically. Remus began to look worriedly at the wall.

"Maybe we should intervene," Remus said nervously, "I am a prefect after all."

There was one more thud, far louder than the rest, and then an unnerving silence.

James and Sirius were out the door before Peter could blink.

"Why do they always have to get involved," Peter muttered to himself as he followed Remus out of the compartment much more slowly than the others.

Peter wasn't sure what was going on when he exited the compartment. Sirius had tackled someone while James pointed his wand at their chest, a girl was in the corner of the compartment was sobbing though she didn't make a noise and a Hufflepuff prefect lay crumpled in heap on the compartment floor.

The one Sirius had in a choke hold was still struggling to reach out for what was presumably his wand, Peter scurried over and snatched it, not wanting the chance of him breaking free and grabbing it up. His own movement seemed to wake Remus from his shock as he suddenly rushed into the compartment to check on the still form and the little girl. Her face was white as death but that was nothing to the body on the floor with a stillness that could never be mistaken for sleep. Remus confirmed his fears when he immediately moved from the dead prefect to the young girl huddled in the corner sobbing much too quietly to be natural.

"Finite Incantatem."

There were a few seconds as she realized she could make noises again before she began to scream, throwing herself into Remus' arms.

The whole car seemed to wake at the sound of her, heads popping out of compartment doors and people piling into the walkway. Evans saw what was going on and immediately ran towards the front of the train for an adult. Peter moved to get a better look at the attacker and was surprised to find he wasn't a Slytherin but a Ravenclaw. Peter had naturally assumed he was a Slytherin. He silently sighed now he'd have to be suspicious of everyone rather than just the Slytherins.

"Relashio!" there was a yell and Sirius hit the wall, the now free Ravenclaw punched a surprised James in the face, breaking his glasses and stealing his wand.

"Expeliarmus," he yelled pointing James' wand at Peter, but as Peter squeaked in panic and hid his face there was a number of loud bangs and when Peter looked back up the first Ravenclaw was on the floor, James was picking up his wand back up a curious look and a triumphant grin on his face, Sirius was attempting to pull himself to his feet and Remus was dueling another Ravenclaw, no doubt the one who hexed Sirius, a few in the crowd had their wand's out to help, including Alice and Frank, but most hid back in their own compartments, Peter wished he were one of them.

The new Ravenclaw, put up a decent fight but was far outnumbered, he managed a good hit on Alice but that alone infuriated both Frank and Sirius and they ended the struggle quick in revenge. James moved to look over Alice as he was better at healing serious wounds than Sirius. Alice had begun to cough up blood. Remus returned to the frightened young girl.

"All right there, Wormtail?" Sirius asked and Peter wondered if he was pale as he felt. Peter nodded, not trusting himself to speak. "Good idea going for his wand." Peter held said wand out to Sirius, his hand shaking and Sirius rolled his eyes, though the smile was still on his face and he took the wand.

Evans came back, a cut on her cheek telling them that this wasn't a solitary event, with the lady who pushed the lunch cart of all people.

"There were attacks on several of the cars up front also," Evans told them, not bothering to be irritated by James' presence for once.

"What about the back cars?" James asked he also was being remarkably serious despite her presence.

"No idea,"

James stood, the lunch trolly lady now caring for Alice herself, he turned to Sirius who nodded at him. The two of them made their way to the exit of the car wands out, Evans followed. Peter looked back at Remus to see if he was expected to follow, Moony, however, made no move to leave so Peter thankfully didn't need to do so either.

The trolly woman locked the two unconscious attackers in an empty compartment and informed them that there would be Aurors waiting on them when they arrived at the platform.

"I- I didn't even know him," the young girl spluttered into Remus' shoulder, speaking for the first time, she was looking at the dead Hufflepuff, before turning to look at the locked compartment. "He just came in and… and," she buried her face in Remus' robes before continuing in a whisper. "I couldn't even screen."

"It's alright, it's over now. You'll be going home soon." He whispered to her shaking his head looking furious. There was a wolfish gleam in his eyes.

There was a slam behind Peter causing everyone to jump in fright and look back at the door. James, Sirius, and Evans were back, all looking quite pale, but not sporting any new injuries. To Peter's surprise, James immediately threw open the closest compartment tossed out the occupants and slammed the door behind him. There were faint sounds of retching coming from the compartment.

"What happened?" Frank asked looking from the compartment door to Sirius and looking frightened by James' action.

"No more bad guys," Evans answered childishly, breathing heavily.

"That's… good," there was suspicion in Remus' voice and Peter could relate.

"Last one decided to take everyone in his car out with him," Sirius explained in a shallow voice.

There was a mixture of horrified gasps and frightened "what?!"s.

"Happened a while ago from the look of it," Sirius told them before the trolley woman could demand more information.

"Blood… everywhere." Evans seemed unable to form full sentences and there was horror on her face. The adult nudged them away so she could go see for herself, seemingly giving them permission to move. Evans, shaking like mad, knelt beside Alice who was looking much better now, while Sirius entered the compartment James had hidden inside.

It was almost a half hour before James and Sirius exited the compartment. James was still pale but Sirius at least had some of his color back. Peter approached when they sat themselves down on the floor.

"Everyone in the car was dead?" Peter asked in horror.

"Dead is a bit of an understatement, Wormtail," Sirius replied also sitting on the floor beside James. Remus crawled over as well the young girl seemed to have found a friend of hers or something and left him alone.

"I managed to get the whole story from her," Remus said. "She's muggleborn, her brother went up front to get some snacks from the trolley and stopped on the way to chat with some friends, that's why she was alone. The Ravenclaw entered shortly after he left put a silencing charm on her and used the cruciatus curse." Sirius winced in sympathy while James hid his face. "As far as I can tell the prefect was just making rounds and must have noticed something was off, obviously he can't tell us what, but she did notice he was surprised at what he found so he hadn't expected what was actually happening. There was a scuffle, which we heard - don't look like that, James. We couldn't possibly have guessed what was happening - the Ravenclaw shot a killing curse at her which the prefect jumped in front of. Then we intervened, no doubt stopping him from just killing her and moving on to the next compartment, which would have been us as the compartment on the other side had seventh years in it."

"So he'd have gotten the crap beat out of him either way." Sirius grinned, Peter figured he was trying to lighten the mood a little but it didn't have much effect.

"Yeah, but this way she survived." James finally lifted his face to look at them.

"Yes," Remus nodded, "What car did they take out? Were there a lot of people on it?"

"Can't have been, wasn't enough gore for it. I can't imagine there were more than ten or twelve people on it, though there's never so few people in a car normally."

"Not enough?! I saw part of someone's brain, Padfoot!"

"I'm not saying I wanted there to be more! I'm just saying there wasn't much for an entire car of people. My guess is, they had some warning but couldn't go for an adult."

"Most of it seemed to be in the front of the car," Evans interrupted, "They could have run into the next car back and had no idea it was over, we didn't check that last car."

"Why not?" Peter asked expecting a tale of heroics.

"Because we didn't exactly feel like stepping over dismembered body parts, Wormatail." James snapped.

"Oh right."

Silence fell over them all as they began the slow wait for the train's return to it's King's Cross platform where parents and siblings and grandparents would be waiting alongside Aurors and magical law enforcement, all of which were waiting with bated breath to see just who was going to get off the train and who had already had their last Christmas.

This wasn't shaping up to be a particularly wonderful holiday.