18.
Peter was rather irritated and well slightly afraid as well. One thing which he had not expected was to have Sirius and James so mad at him and actually gang up on him; he had thought that they would be happy or even proud when they learned that he had been feeding Remus silver; ensuring a slow, painful torturous death. Why on earth where they so upset over the fact that he had attempted to kill the filthy half-breed? It didn't make sense to him and as soon as he got his hands on the freak, he was going to make it pay for whatever James and Sirius were about to do to him. How had they even found out? If the stupid monster had told someone then it would be lucky if it managed to survive the night, Peter would see to it that the freak was either dead or close to it by the nights end and it would not tell anyone again, nor would it go searching for help. Peter was going to teach the half-breed exactly what it meant to be a half-breed and the proper meaning of fear; the thing would know how to be afraid by the time that the night was over.
James had been wandering the halls of the school, not really sure what he was searching for, he had just turned a corner when he saw two figures supporting a third who couldn't seem to breathe properly. They seemed to be heading towards the hospital wing, James was about to continue down the corridor without giving them a second thought before he got close enough to see that the one that was being supported was Lupin. It took a moment for James to get over his shock enough to be able to move forward and follow them, hoping to get close enough to hear what was wrong with him and yet be far enough away that Snivellus wouldn't see him and possibly cause a problem, for right now it was more important to figure out what was wrong with Lupin. He had hurriedly whipped out his invisibility cloak and followed a bit more closely now that he was no longer in danger of being seen; he stayed by the bed that Lupin was placed on as the matron waved her wand to figure out what was wrong with him. When he heard that Lupin had silver inside him and that it had been eating away at his insides, James was furious and he departed from the hospital wing as silently as he could; he had to talk to Sirius, and then they had to find that son-of-a-mongrel known as Peter.
James didn't think that anyone could be more angry or scary looking than McGonagall, he was wrong and that in itself was rather scary for him. Sirius was livid. James had had to physically restrain him in order to keep him from throttling Peter where he stood—of course James had been hard pressed not to strangle the git as well—Peter'd had the nerve to simply stand there and look at them rather incredulously. James was attempting to restrain Sirius from physically harming Peter, though there was nothing he could do about Sirius's wand waving, and honestly James didn't want to stop Sirius from harming Peter. James had never been this angry before and he was unsure how to deal with it, or even what the appropriate outlet would be for said anger.
"How DARE you try to kill him! Neither of us has agreed with what you have been doing to him, but neither have we helped him—which I deeply regret—however I think that I remember telling you NOT to kill him!" Sirius snarled, his face contorted into an expression beyond fury, he waved his wand and muttered a hex that he had been saving for Snape. This seemed a much more worthy cause, especially when Snape was the one that was helping Lupin instead of them….they couldn't quite bring themselves to dislike the boy as much as they had previously.
Peter yelped as the hex hit him and he was instantly covered in boils—burning, angry looking boils, covering every inch of his skin—Peter hunched over, his hands clutching his face.
"He was always a better, kinder person than you. You are the monster, not him! Lupin may be a werewolf, but you are the one who inflicts pain and suffering on those around him, he is utterly incapable of harming another person while you seem incapable of anything resembling kindness!" Both James and Sirius fired hex after hex at the boy before them, not stopping as they vented their anger and made him nearly unrecognizable.
His knees buckled and he fell to the floor as he was hit with more hexes, changing his skin, hair and nails…making them grow and twist, his skin growing rough and splotchy. He cowered on the floor before James and Sirius, watching their raised wands from between his fingers, a sense of fear growing inside him, wondering what they would do to him.
For ten minutes both James and Sirius cast spell after spell at the boy before them, reducing him to an unrecognizable quivering mass, cowering before them. Both boys slowly lowered their wands and turned from him, giving looks of utter disgust at the boy on the floor and storming out of the dormitory, leaving Gryffindor tower and hoping to find Lupin before he was discharged from the hospital so that they could apologize profusely; they both wondered if he would even be able to accept them as his friends again.
Peter waited until he was sure that the others would have left before making his way down to the hospital wing—the matron healed him in seconds and he didn't even have to tell her what happened—then he returned to Gryffindor tower. He seethed silently as he waited in the common room for the return of the freak, so he could extract his revenge for what had been done to him.
Thank you for reading, I do hope that you are enjoying the story so far. Please R&R.