"Can I be their secret keeper?"
Peter's question was loaded.
Figuratively and metaphorically speaking, it was in all intents and purposes that way. He suspected Remus of being a spy. He had a strong hunch that his childhood friend was hiding something from him. Something very significant. What could it be? Being a Death Eater? Sirius looked toward his long time friend. Perhaps not a Death Eater, but something more important than that, then came to his decision.
The lives of the Potters was in his hands. His Godson. His best friends.
"No." Sirius said.
And with that, his fate was sealed.
"Sirius Black, where are they?"
He was bound against a tree trapped by branches, vines, and what not. It was difficult to move being restrained against a tree. Not a lamp post as he had imagined a week after becoming the Potters secret keeper. Not a sign alongside the sidewalk. Not a advertisement sign. Not a bus or a car or a carriage or-anything, really. It was everything that was unlikely. Voldemort held his wand close to him.
"I will never tell you."
Voldemort hummed.
"I will find some means of finding them."
He twirled his wand as he smiled.
"I will torture you, hours between, and wait for you to tell me on your free will with breaks."
Sirius spat on to the Dark Lord's face.
"Over my dead body!" Sirius replied.
One of Voldemort's Death Eaters picked up the wand then walked to his side.
"Then the pain will kill you." Voldemort's face darkened. "Cruciatus!"
A flash of blue then he fell into a world of pain.
Sirius drifted in and out of the world of pain. Coming to on the ground after being cut down after hours against the tree with what little sanity that he had left. He knew the situation at hand. He recalled the steps that lead him here. He recalled little basic numbers and equations, intelligence, logic-and his mind tricked him for a second that he was in a field of florescent grass. It was colorful and glowing against the darkness that was hovering over it. He was losing it and he knew it. He knew it wasn't florescent. It was green.
Green as Lily's eyes. Green with life, hope, and renewal. Of kindness and connection. Of growth that meant continuation of seeds planted. Seeds sowed long ago. He lifted himself up, halfway, then fell to the grassy plain of the ground beneath him with a huff. His figure ached in pain and certain soreness in his muscles. Daylight was breaking and the clouds were parting.
His muscles relaxed laid there on the ground.
Voldemort towered over him.
"Ready to talk?"
Prongs, Lily, Prongslet!
The family happy together, alive, laughing flashed across his mind. A memory of them at a beach flickered across his mind with Peter playing peek-a-boo with the young child and the boy letting go of precious laughter as Remus and he were close by surfing the waves. Lily and James resting on their chairs enjoying the weather. It was the perfect day in which they got to relax and have fun.
The thought of them alive gave him strength and the thought of them dead gave him defiance against that image. If he died, then the charm would fail. And Wormtail would be prone to giving out the location as would Remus and the other members. He replayed the memory in his mind on loop with the sound of the waves, the sound of Remus's laughter once Sirius had started to crash -and took the man with him-into the water. Sirius started to laugh, himself. It started as a slow rumble that turned into a loud, pained, exhausted laughter.
Well intended as it was; the daring proclamation of defiance would doom them all. His fingers dug into the grass as his head was lowered to the ground. No, Sirius thought. Magic or muggle causes. I am not letting go that easily. His figure trembled as he lifted himself up to his feet then hit his back against the tree. Sirius, defiantly, looked back up at him with sweat covering him.
Prongs, Lily, Prongslet, Moony, Wormtail. He thought to them. Please, remember me the way I was before.
"No." And this time, as he slumped, he smiled. "Give me your best curse." He paused with a pant. "Tom Riddle."
Voldemort became heavily outraged.
"Avada Kedavra!"
Out of spite, out of love; Sirius remained. It was much to the shock, confusion, and rage of the Dark Lord. The Dark Lord wore a expression that Sirius hadn't quite seen from anyone. It looked as if he were about to faint. The Dark Lord fainting by a Marauder? Unheard of, but, Sirius sensed that he was about to. Sirius lifted his head up toward the dark lord.
"That all you got?" He grinned, the bright memory louder and more brighter than the dark bleakness of this situation.
"Cruciatus!"
And he was back out.
He was back in. Sirius had a distinctive feeling that it was the afternoon. His body ached and screamed for rest. His soul yearned for freedom and recovery. The trembling that his body was left in was enough to summon being cradled and comforted-but, he was not. He can feel grass beneath his fingertips. He only knew pain and that was it. It was strange not to be in it in the lapse of it.
"Talk, now?"
Memories of creatures, deer laying on the beach side, a little fawn watching a large rat play peek-a-boo, and a strange mangy werewolf wearing a necklace with a heart and he felt it was his heart alongside him on a surfboard laughing at him. It was his heart that it was wearing. And the deer wore collars that he distinctively felt were his collars. Identification that they were a part of a group. Part of his group. And when he opened his eyes, he saw the man as a animal control officer with a long stick that had a rounded silver end.
"The pain they are leaving you in will be over."
His mind washed back to the creatures very dear to him.
"No."
And he sealed his fate, printed, stamped, watching the animal control officer become furious.
"Cruciatus!"
And he fell into oblivion with screams.
From behind the Dark Lord, Snape looked on in horror as he saw someone he had despised slip away as the hours passed by. Snape started to tremble growing concerned and pained by the unspeakable horror that was being thrust upon him. Someone who Lily liked was being put through pain. The pain that her friend was being hurt started to ache at him. The thought of her reaction to it clawed at him.
Voldemort looked on in delight as the man suffered over due than what he was allowed and it was gnawing at him.
Snape couldn't watch it no longer so he raised his wand up and silently chanted, "Avada Kedavra."
And Voldemort was no more.
Snape looked on as the final cast of the curse wore off.
And Sirius started to laugh that grew in volume until it were a booming laugh that horrified the double agent above him.
Sirius was insane.