So one day, my brother and I overthought the concept of 'what would have happened if the first Secret-Keeper was Remus Lupin and not Sirius Black' which led to me writing what would happen throughout the years 1981 to 1998 if that was the case.
The thing you are going to read right now will hopefully be the first part of a series that will follow that concept.
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, and I like to think of myself as a sensible person, so no, I'm not transphobic.
Sirius Black was desperate, he had every reason in the world to be desperate, and Lily and James Potter knew that. Sirius's brother died just a year ago, only eighteen years old, because he was a death eater, meaning the only thing on Sirius's mind right now was killing Voldemort. That meant going as far as trying to get the whereabouts of the dark lord from his lovely death eater cousins.
Lily and James Potter both knew that for that reason, Sirius couldn't be trusted to be their Secret-Keeper so they chose Remus Lupin instead and told Albus Dumbledore.
But Remus was scared, too scared. It didn't matter how trustworthy he was, or how many precautions he'd take, he was still a werewolf, meaning he could find himself in places he didn't even know about, and that was not a good quality for a Secret-Keeper. So he told Lily and James he couldn't do it. Lily and James thought he was needlessly worrying, but Remus was stubborn and insisted that they need to switch to Peter Pettigrew, who was, as Remus put it, "the most regular person of us marauders and the last one to be suspected". So they switched, but this time they did it without telling Dumbledore nor Sirius, for the sake of being as safe as possible.
But Peter was a rat, and trusting him was probably the worst decision they ever made because, in the end, it was what got them killed.
Lily and James were killed in all hallows' eve 1981 by the dark lord. their son, Harry, was hit by the killing curse as well, but he did not die, more than that, he vanquished the Dark Lord, ending the wizarding war. Harry James Potter was only one year old at the time.
Peter Pettigrew was a bloody rat. Being a very loyal Death Eater, the first thing he did after the Dark Lord killed the only friends he ever had, whom he did not mourn for a minute, was to sneak into his former friends' house in the dead of night, take the Dark Lord's wand and hide it in a place where no one will search for it.
Remus Lupin, on the other hand, was a good friend, and that night, it was almost 4 AM, he went to check on his 'friend', to check on Peter. He did it a little after Peter went to the Potters' house and came back (not that he knew it even happened), but when Remus went to Peter's hideout, Peter wasn't there, and Remus started panicking. But then he concentrated and tried to use his wolf senses to try and feel if something had happened; even though there was no sign of a struggle or anything else that would explain Peter's disappearance, Peter's scent… it was still there, a thing that could indicate one of two things: either that Peter didn't leave the hideout that long ago, or that he was somewhere nearby.
Remus started searching; if Peter apparated from the place, there was a very small chance that Remus would find him, but he still could've been nearby. Remus got out of the hideout and started looking for a sign of Peter. it took a while, but he found him: he was two blocks away from his hideout and looked like he was waiting for someone.
'Remus,' Peter started, in a mocking voice 'I didn't think it would be you, it was a lot more likely that Sirius would be the one to come, but a werewolf in Halloween is entertaining.'
'What the hell are you on about?' asked Remus.
'Haven't you heard yet? The Potters are dead,' he said.
Remus backed away like he was hit in the stomach with something hard. 'W-what are you talking about? Th-they were supposed to be safe!Youwere supposed to keep them safe!'
'You happened,' Peter started shouting and sobbing, 'it was Lily and James, Remus! How could you?!'
It only took a moment for Remus to realize what really happened, and he raised his wand against Peter, but he was not quick enough. Peter already had his own wand in hand; he blew up the street withConfringo, cut off his own toe, transformed into his rat form and ran away.
Remus was left alone, and when the Hit Wizards showed up, they arrested him for killing five Muggles and one wizard, for giving the information about the Potters' whereabouts which lead to their death, and for service to Lord Voldemort.
There was no trial, mostly for the fact that Remus was a werewolf and no one counted werewolves as people, the common opinion about them being that they were all a danger to society, some people even going as far as to say that keeping him alive was mercy, and the ministry should have let him get the Dementor's kiss or just kill him.
And on that day, the most terrible twelve years of Remus's life started.
Please comment! I would like to know what you thought about it.