Mindscape

Summer, 1981

"Depulso!" James yelled as he cast his spell at a Death Eater. The dark wizard grunted as his body flew back into a large tree trunk. He fell to the forest floor in an unconscious heap. James smiled triumphantly. He turned to face his three closest friends. "That's the last one. I think we're clear." James said.

"Good, next time they'll think twice before coming after us!" Sirius cheered.

"I hope there isn't a next time." Peter mumbled. "That was scary."

"Not as scary as it would have been if someone worse came with them. I wouldn't want to face Bellatrix or Rozier." Remus stated thoughtfully.

James walked closer to his friends. "We need to get out of here before more come around."

Sirius smirked. "More like you need to get home before Lily finds out about your adventure?" Sirius motioned to James's invisibility cloak lying in the grass. "Unless of course Harry woke her up and she noticed you were gone?"

James pinched the bridge of his nose and lowered his head. "Oh Merlin, I hope not." He breathed out. "I'd be a dead man before I could get a foot in the door." He raised his head and adjusted his glasses. "Harry has been sleeping a lot better lately." He checked his watch. "He usually wakes up around two o'clock in the morning, so I have another hour. I hope."

"So quick to celebrate a small victory." A quiet, yet menacing voice came from beyond the forest clearing.

Sirius recognized the voice. He moved to stand in between the voice and his friends. "Stand back, guys." Sirius warned them. A figure crept up to them, a man dressed in black robes, his skin white as a ghost's, and his eyes were blood red. "Voldemort." Sirius uttered the name of the mass murderer before him.

Lord Voldemort frowned at the young man with the long, black hair. "Ah, yes. Sirius Black. You are a bold one. Perhaps you need to be taught a lesson, blood-traitor." Then, as suddenly as he appeared, he vanished. In his place, a thick, black fog floated across the grass. When it reached Sirius, the young wizard fell to the forest floor, like a puppet whose strings had been cut.

"SIRIUS!" James hollered as he bolted over to his best friend. Once he reached Sirius, James dropped to his knees beside the dark-haired wizard and leaned over him, surveying his body to find out what was wrong. Sirius's whole body was twitching, his eyes rolled over white, his breathing nothing more than sputtering gasps. Peter couldn't bear to see his friend like that and looked away from where Sirius was. Remus, who was not far behind James, knelt down on the opposite side of their fallen friend. James grasped Sirius's shoulders and started to shake his friend. "Sirius? Padfoot, what's wrong? Sirius, come on, mate! Wake up!" James shouted, his voice grew increasingly desperate with each sentence. The only response he got from the young Animagus was a quiet, strangled whimper. When he realized nothing was changing, he let go of his best friend's shoulders. He raised his head and looked at Remus with pleading eyes. "What's wrong with him, Moony?" James asked, panting.

Remus was quickly glancing over Sirius's body from head to toe. "I don't think it was poison." Remus thought out loud. He searched around the area where Voldemort once stood. Then, he remembered something Dorcas had mentioned to him a few months ago. A chill crept up his spine. "Oh God." Remus whispered, his eyes widened in fear as they fell on his convulsing friend. Dorcas had told Remus about the tragic fate of another member of the Order, a man not much older than they were. She described in vivid, horrific detail as she watched as Lord Voldemort penetrated the poor young wizard's mind, drove the man insane, how the poor soul begged for death, and then Voldemort slaughtered him, calling it mercy. Remus shuddered.

James saw the terror in Remus's eyes and his heart started beating faster. "What? Remus, what is it?" When Remus shook his head and remained silent, James screamed. "MERLIN REMUS! WHAT DID VOLDEMORT DO TO HIM?!"

Remus didn't want to scare James any more than what he already was, so he answered shortly. "Voldemort is in his head, Prongs."

James's eyes widened to match Remus's. "No." Was all James could manage. Refusing to believe what his werewolf friend just told him, James grabbed Sirius's arm again and shook it, attempting to reach him again. "SIRIUS!"

Sirius Black shot upright, but something was terribly wrong. The forest where he was looked different than it did a moment ago. Even for the dead of night, the forest was pitch black. Sirius had difficulty seeing the closest trees near him. Dark fog swirled around him. He looked frantically around the forest and noticed his friends were gone. "Guys?" He quickly rose to his feet. "James? Remus? Peter?" He called for his friends. He felt what he thought was a tight grip on his shoulders but reached for his right shoulder and found nothing was there, same with his left. He heard echoes of familiar voices in the distance, so he started walking through the dense smog towards them.

Suddenly, the clouds in the sky shifted to reveal an illuminating full moon. Sirius raised an eyebrow. The moon wasn't supposed to be full for another two weeks. Had he been unconscious for that long? Then, the pale moonlight turned red. A Blood Moon. Sirius felt the phantom touch again on his arm. A blood-curdling scream rang through the woods, screaming Sirius's name. The young wizard broke into a sprint towards the voice. He recognized it instantly. "James?!" He called out louder to his friend, but to his dismay, no reply. "JAMES!" Sirius cried.

"James." James heard Sirius whisper his name.

His eyes flickered with hope as he gripped Sirius's arm tighter. "I'm here, Sirius. I'm right here!" He said with a smile. "Come on, Padfoot, please! You have to fight him! Come on, mate! Wake up!" James pleaded, but to no avail. Sirius's body continued to shake and twitch, despite James's grip on his arm.

Remus watched Sirius, monitoring his worsening condition. Sirius's breath hitched, then he gasped and coughed. His skin went white, and he looked as if he was struggling to breathe. The black-haired wizard's chest heaved as his body tried to get air into his slowly, starving lungs. Remus alerted James. "James, he can't breathe!" To Remus and James's horror, Sirius's lips started to turn blue.

Sirius kept running towards the direction of James's voice. The further he ran, the more Sirius noticed the murky forest began to change. The dirt trails transformed to paved streets, the titan-like trees became town houses, and the shrubs turned into iron gates and brick walls. He knew where he was now and loathed it. Number 12 Grimmauld Place. It was home, although Sirius never thought of this place as a real home. It looked as if it was being ripped apart piece by piece. The heads of the house elves were off the walls and floating around the space, the Black Family Tree was shredded and flapping in the wind like a tattered pirate's flag, and his mother's portrait was hanging crooked and swaying off the wall, with massive claw marks slashed across the canvas. "Something terrible happened here." Sirius mumbled to himself.

"Such a pity you were not here to stop it." A menacing voice hissed from behind the Animagus. "If you truly cared about your friends, blood-traitor, why would you leave them to die?"

Sirius turned around to see Voldemort standing in front of four grand pillars, three of them had figures buried under massive snakes slithering around their stiff forms. When Sirius was able to see the figures more clearly, a gut-wrenching howl forced its way through his lips. The figures were his three closest friends.

Peter was farthest to the right, a look of permanent terror lay frozen upon his pale face. A pair of large holes in his neck; one of the snakes must have got him. Remus was on the left, still in his werewolf form. There were massive, clawed gashes in his furry chest. The blood either had dried or ran out, Sirius didn't know which was worse to think about. He had hope that James was still alive, just asleep, because he did not look as bad as the others. However, that hope was gone when he saw James's unseeing eyes behind his cracked glasses. Sirius's whole body felt numb as his legs buckled and he collapsed to the floor. "No." He moaned as he buried his face into his hands, tears welling into his eyes. "They can't be…"

"Oh, but they are, Black. They are dead. Would you like to join them?" Voldemort sneered as he raised Sirius into the air and threw him into the last pillar. The snakes, sensing fresh food, quickly slithered over to Sirius and began wrapping themselves around his body. He struggled against them, but the large pythons were too strong. By the time the snakes wrapped around his chest and his neck, viciously suffocating him, he felt that he was too weak to fight against them any longer. Voldemort smiled and raised his wand towards Sirius and suddenly, horrible memories flooded into the young wizard's mind. He saw his parents spitting their cruel words at him. He saw the last conversation he had with his little brother Regulus. He saw how Remus reacted to Sirius's deadly prank on Snape. All of their venomous voices seemed to screech all at once, ringing through his ears like nails clawing at a chalkboard. He couldn't bear any more of it. Sirius screamed as loud as he could, scattered tears running down his pale cheeks. Although, what came out sounded less like a scream and more like a choked cry. "Stop it! Please, anyone! Help me!"

"Help me…" Remus heard Sirius choke out in the middle of gasping for air.

The werewolf grasped Sirius's shoulders, more tightly than James had before. "Sirius, we're right here! How can we help? Sirius, please, talk to us! How can we help?" Remus begged.

Sirius had to be imagining it. He could have sworn he heard his friend's voice, but that couldn't be real. Voldemort killed his friends. He was trapped right next to his friends' bodies, but he couldn't help but find comfort in the words the voice was saying. The voice asked how it could help, so Sirius answered as best as he could. "Keep talking." He gasped, praying the angelic voice would hear him. He didn't want to be left to face this torment alone.

"Keep…talking…" Sirius whispered.

Remus's heart sank. His Animagus companion sounded exhausted and desperate. He couldn't have begun to imagine what Voldemort was doing to him, making him see, or making him feel. Remus held onto Sirius's shoulders. "I'm not going anywhere, Sirius." Remus said soothingly. "You're not alone. Whatever he's showing you, it's not real."

James saw what Remus was doing and grabbed his best friend's pale hand. "Yeah, Padfoot, you're way tougher than Voldemort! Don't let him scare you! You can beat him!" He encouraged Sirius. His hazel eyes glistened behind his glasses when he saw Sirius begin to breathe normally again. He continued speaking to his friend. He leaned in close to Sirius's ear. "You're the strongest one out of all of us, mate. We need you, Sirius. I need you, Remus needs you, Lily needs you, so does Peter. But, do you know who needs you the most? Harry. Harry needs you Sirius. He needs his godfather."

Harry. The name rang through Sirius's ears. He looked at the malevolent force in front of him snickering at him. Sirius couldn't die. He couldn't leave Harry alone to face this monster. If his friends were gone, who would protect Lily and Harry? Voldemort strode over and was inches away from Sirius's face. "Now, will you beg for death, Black? After all, I am a merciful lord. I will oblige. Would you like to join your friends?" Voldemort raised his wand and pointed it at Sirius's temple.

Sirius's fearful expression changed, like flicking a Muggle light switch, to one of determination. All of the words from the voices sunk in. They were his friends. James and Remus were still alive. "This isn't real." Sirius gasped. The snakes' constricting bodies loosened around his own. He saw an opening and reached into his jacket pocket. He didn't have his wand, but he did have a weapon. He pulled his knife out of his pocket and stabbed one of the snakes, the one wrapped around his chest. Voldemort hissed and recoiled, as if Sirius stabbed him. All of the snakes did the same, releasing Sirius from their grip. The young wizard dropped to the floor. Sirius quickly rose to his feet and started running, following the sound of his friends' voices in the distance. Voldemort recovered from Sirius's attack and started casting spells in his direction. Flashes of green scattered and danced around Sirius as he wildly dodged them. The dark wizard roared as his spells grew more furious. Sirius ran, not just for his life, not just for his friends, but for the infant boy he vowed to look after and protect.

James and Remus saw a faint black fog rise from their friend's body. Then, Sirius's grey eyes shot open as he bolted upright, chest heaving, with a look of fear on his sweat-drenched face. Remus, who let go of Sirius's shoulders, wrapped his arms around the young man and embraced him. "It's alright, Sirius, you're okay. You're back. You're okay." Remus comforted him.

James joined the embrace, his arms shaking slightly. "I-I thought we lost you, mate." He admitted quietly.

Sirius grasped James's arm tightly and used his other arm to grip Remus's. "I thought I lost you both." Sirius panted. "He-he made me think…" Sirius couldn't finish. He shuddered.

"That's why you asked us to talk to you." Lupin realized.

Sirius looked directly at his best friend. "I couldn't just give up." A smile steadily returned to the Animagus's face. "After all, Harry needs me too, right?"

James returned the smile. "We all do, mate."