So we didn't see more of Stubby in HBP. I'm a bit disappointed. Oh, well, at least I can make up more weird theories (:

II(:

PS. Warning: Might contain spoilers ;P

4. Neither true, nor false

'This is really weird,' Harry said 'Using an article from the Quibbler to look for Voldemort's Horcruxes.'

'It's not like an article from the Prophet would be more useful,' Luna pointed out.

'Still, this is ridiculous,' said Ron 'I mean, this can't be him. And even if it was, it doesn't mean it was him. For all we know, R.A.B. could stand for Really Annoying Bugger!'

'But Regulus Black seems to fit…'

'But this Boardman guy doesn't!' Hermione argued 'Harry, you can't believe all ideas Luna gets from the Quibbler. There's no such thing as a Crumple-Horned Snorcack, no Rotfang Conspiracy and this guy cannot help us -'

Luna looked rather offended at this, but instead of trying to argue she simply said

'Only one way to find out,' and knocked on the door.

After a few seconds the door was opened by a man who, to Harry's surprise, resambled Sirius quite a lot. It would be hard to mistake the two of them, but judging by the way Stubby Boardman looked, they could have been related in some way.

'NO, NO AND NO!' the man shouted 'NOW LEAVE ME ALONE, YOU QUIBBLER-READING FREAKS!' And he slammed the door before they could say anything.

'He's got his mother's temper,' Ron observed.

'He won't let us in,' Hermione said 'Now can we please go? It's not -'

'No. I need to talk to him,' Harry told her. He'd had some doubts about it in the beginning, but now he was almost sure of it. He knocked on the door once again.

'What is your problem?' Boardman asked furiously as he opened the door again.

'Glad you want to talk about it,' said Harry 'We need your help.'

After a few minutes of arguing it turned out that Luna's Quibbler-inspired idea had been far from the truth. Not very far, though. Stubby Boardman finally agreed to tell them the story…

XXX

Much earlier…

Stubby opened the door to see a face disturbingly similar to his own, although considerably younger.

'Rigel(1), is that you?' the stranger asked. Stubby stared at him. Noone had called him that for a long time. Few people knew his real name at all. How did the stranger know? And who was he anyway?

'Yeah, but don't call me that,' he told him 'I don't like that name.'

That might have been because his name, Rigel Antares(2), was the only thing he could think of that his biological parents had ever given him. He had hated the name ever since he found out that he had been adopted and his real mother and father didn't want to have anything to do with him just because he was a Squib. (He was about o find out that maybe he had been lucky after all.)

'How did you know it anyway?' he asked.

'It wasn't easy,' the young man admitted 'but I just really needed to find you…'

'And why is that?'

'It is a long story. Can I come in?'

'All right,' said Stubby. He wasn't sure it was a good idea, but he didn't have a better one.

'Ok,' said Stubby once they were both inside his flat 'Who are you, what do you want and why do you want it from me of all the people?'

The guest took a deep breath and began to answer the last question.

'My other brother wouldn't want to talk to me,' he said 'Telling anybody else wouldn't be safe. I'd have to tell you the whole story to explain it properly.'

'But why me? I still don't get it. And what do you mean by "my other brother"?'

'I told you -' the stranger paused for a moment 'I haven't, have I?' Stubby shook his head, still rather confused 'Well,' the stranger finally introduced himself 'My name is Regulus Black.'

The name most certainly did ring a bell. And the bell didn't sound cheerful. Black was the name of Stubby's biological parents.

'Oh, is it?' he said. He wasn't sure he liked Regulus.

'I'm your brother… kind of…'

'Oh, I figured out that much,' Stubby said 'You could easily be my clone. Except that you're not a Squib, of course. So what do you want?' he asked 'Why do you suddenly remember a lousy Squib you never wanted to have in your family?'

'Erm… I…' Regulus hesitated 'Would like you to help me hide something.' He produced a rather ancient-looking golden locket.

'What the hell is that?' Stubby asked.

'Trust me, you're safer not knowing,' Regulus assured him 'I can tell you a bit of the story, but you don't want to know all of it.'

'So what am I supposed to do with it?' Stubby asked, having heard what seemed like the whole story of Regulus's life.

'Just keep it safe for me for a while,' Regulus said 'You know. Don't tell anybody we've ever met, hide it somewhere nobody can find it, that sort of stuff. I'll come back to pick it up as soon as it's safe, I promise.'

XXX

'But he never came back,' Stubby finished the story 'They got him about two days after that.'

Harry stared at him in disbelief.

'You… you've got the locket?' he asked.

'Uh…' Stubby didn't seem to know what to do. But it was too late to deny it 'What do you want it for?'

'We have to destroy it,' Ron said before he could think about it.

'I was supposed to keep it safe.'

'I'm sure that's not what Regulus meant. He wanted to destroy it himself.'

'Oh, did he?' said Stubby suspiciously.

Suddenly Hermione had an idea.

'You still don't know what it is, do you?' she asked.

'No idea,' he admitted.

'If we tell you, will you give it to us?'

'I'll think about it.'

XXX

'I told you,' Luna said.

'You told us many things…' Hermione pointed out.

'So what do we do now?' Ron wanted to know.

'How about finding out the truth about the Rotfang Conspiracy?' Luna suggested.

'For the last time, Luna,' Hermione said angrily 'There's no such thing as -'

She stopped talking suddenly. A Crumple-Horned Snorcack ran across the road.

(1) a star in Orion, I think.

(2) a star in Scorpio. Check out his initials, by the way ;)

The Snorcacks are real! Why doesn't anybody believe me?

Oh yeah. Knowing the Black family, Squibs don't show up on the family tree. I justdidn't know where to put it in the story.

II(: