Disclaimer: I have started sleeping with a copy of Deathly Hallows under my pillow in an attempt to absorb J.K.'s brilliance, but as this hasn't worked, I still do not own Harry Potter.

(A/N: As the authoress is cowering in fear of impending flames, I, her personal muse , (or as she would have it, "that lazy bastard") have been instructed to relay the following information.

1. Yes, Remus really did mean to say "stupidest stupid". Because James says a lot of stupid things.

2. She knows it is short and took forever, and she is at least moderately sorry for that.

3. She took some liberities with the concept of time dilation and invites you to deal with them or do a complicated activity involving a lot of expletives that for the sake of common decency I will not repeat.

Anything you still can't cope with is therefore your own problem.

Yours with Moderate Sincerity,

Eden the Muse)

Chapter 5: Desperate Times

"The problem," said Remus many hours later, "is time dilation. And it's getting worse."

His friends' blank, disinterested faces stared back at him, and Remus sighed enormously. "You've got absolutely no idea what that is."

"None whatsoever."

"But it sounds awful," Peter said consolingly. His discontent at having been left alone in the Shrieking Shack for several hours had evaporated the minute they'd showed him the room they'd discovered in his absence; changing once again to accommodate them, it now bore a startling resemblance to the Gryffindor common room.

"Does it?" Sirius said with a yawn. He didn't sound very bothered by the idea.

"Are you ever actually planning on telling us what you're on about, Moony?" asked James impatiently.

Remus ground his molars in irritation. "Are you actually planning on listening this time?"

"Only if you promise to drag it out for ages with over-dramatic pauses every three or four seconds," said Sirius. "I do so love having no idea what's going on."

"Shut up," Remus snapped. "And listen." He paused, trying to ignore Sirius's smug grin. "All right. We can tell from yesterday that the loop is starting to affect us more than it used to." Again with the blank looks. Remus scowled. "Do I usually Change in the middle of the afternoon?"

"No," said Peter, though the question was clearly rhetorical.

"And it took ages," Sirius remarked thoughtfully. "Loads longer than usual."

"Exactly," said Remus, relieved they were catching on. "Time is starting to distort around us. I don't know how we're going to stop it speeding up or slowing down or when it's going to—what?"

Peter had his hand raised for some reason. "I'm sorry! It's just—I think someone's outside, I heard—"

James rolled his eyes. "I told you what Snivellus said, Wormtail. Hardly anyone even knows this place is here. Shut up and let Remus get on with it."

Remus cleared his throat and continued, "Well, it's only going to get worse. We've got to do something about that—oh for Merlin's sake, Peter, you don't need to put your bloody hand up!"

"Sorry! But I think I heard—"

"The sound of your own paranoia?" Sirius asked politely. "Shut up worrying, Wormtail. It's distracting me from Moony's fascinating explanation."

Remus threw his hands up and snapped, "If we don't work out a way to fix that sodding Time-Turner, we're all completely buggered, all right?"

The other three blinked in astonishment. Remus wasn't much for swearing.

"Bloody hell, Moony, calm down," James said.

"Why should I? Panicking is the only reasonable option at this point!" He was breathing heavily and shouting without having noticed he was doing either. "I don't know what to do! I have no bloody idea how to fix that thing, I hardly even know how it works and being calm won't make a damn bit of difference and—and—" He stopped abruptly and tried to compose himself. "What are we supposed to do now?"

The three least used and most unlikely words in James's vocabulary suddenly decided to come out of his mouth. "Turn ourselves in?"

Sirius looked at him, and James smirked minutely. "Only joking. Cheer up, Moony. We don't get top marks for just anything. We'll come up with something."

Remus nodded vaguely, not altogether reassured. "We'll have to," he said, and sank back into his chair to think.

OoOoOo

It was another two hours before the beginnings of a plan began to form in James's head. "I don't suppose—" He let a thoughtful pause hang for a moment, then said, "Do you think McGonagall still has a Time-Turner?"

Sirius looked up, slightly startled. "What?"

"In her office. If we could get it—"

"No," Remus said immediately.

"Why not?"

Remus sucked his breath in irritably. "That might actually be the stupidest stupid thing I've ever heard you say."

"What have we got to lose at this stage? Even if it goes horribly wrong, we'll only end up in the dormitory again," Sirius put in. "So it's really nothing to worry about."

Remus did not look any less annoyed. "Has it at any point occurred to you that doing the exact same thing that got us into all this trouble in the first place may not be the best of ideas?"

"Look, if we want to know how to fix a broken Time-Turner, we're going to need to know what a working one is like first, aren't we?" said James insistently.

Remus sighed. There was really no point in arguing, as James always seemed to get his way in the end.

The minute they touched the floor on the other side of the unassuming doorway, they found they were touching the floor in the dormitory.

Peter at least managed this time without being sick, though he still seemed to be having a minor asthma attack for several minutes afterward.

"That really is the weirdest room I've ever been in," he said when he'd caught his breath.

James shrugged as he changed out of his pajamas in into his robes. There was still a whole day's worth of redundant lessons before they could put their plan into action.

OoOoOo

"You had all day and you still couldn't come up with anything better than the toilets? Again?"

"What're you complaining about, Moony? It it got her out of the office, didn't it?"

"I will never understand you propensity for repeating plans that don't work," Remus muttered.

"Like Padfoot said," James responded, a bit distractedly as he was in the process of removing his Invisibility Cloak at the time, "does it really matter if we get caught?"

"I just think—"

"OW! What in the hell—?"

James held a hand to his bleeding face and whirled around, whipping out his wand.

Remus put his arm up to keep James from charging at the boy who had suddenly appeared without any of them noticing. "He did help us," he said very quietly.

"Not as far as he knows," Sirius said bitterly. "He won't remember it anyway. Don't see why we should leave him alone now."

Remus tried his luck with Snape. "Look, this is the one time he hasn't done anything to you. Can't you just leave off each other for once?"

Snape's black eyes flared. "I'll leave off him when he leaves off Lily Evans!" He immediately flushed, clearly not having meant to say this.

Remus sighed and backed away. James was more likely to eat his cauldron than let a comment like that slide.

"Lily Evans?" James said in a dangerous tone, eyes flashing and wand raised. "Lily Evans can't stand you, nor can anyone else, you greasy little git. She hates—"

"SECTUMSEMPRA!" Snape roared suddenly.

James was grateful for the lightning fast reflexes years of Seeking had helped him develop, as he managed to throw up a Shield Charm in the last second before Snape's spell collided.

The flash as the spell rebounded was bright enough to blind James for several seconds. The next thing he saw was blood. A lot of blood. Entirely too much, in fact, for someone to leave on the floor without being dead or very near it.

He could only hope it was the latter.