Chapter One

Remus Lupin shuffled his feet nervously as he stood on platform 9 and ¾. He had gotten there an hour early so that he would be able to get his own compartment. Even though he had arrived so early there were many other people at the station, and he wasn't used to being around so many people. Going to Diagon Alley last week had been the first time in six years that he had seen any one other than his parents, since his relatives were too afraid to visit him after his accident. He gave his mother a tightlipped smile as she hugged him good-bye. Finally the moment of his departure had arrived. His mother tried desperately not to cry, as she whispered in his hear to have a wonderful time and make friends. His father gave him an impatient nod, wishing to get back to his work, and reminded him never to let anyone know, and to stay away from anyone suspicious. Don't let anyone get to close. Remus nodded in return to his father, gave his mother one last smile, promised to write, and walked onto the train.

On the train he dragged his trunk along, his muscles protesting. With the full moon being less than a week away he was rapidly loosing strength, and all he really wanted to do was sleep. But any potential friends would think him pathetic if he couldn't go half a day without a nap, so he couldn't sleep. He found an empty compartment near the rear of the train, but lacked the ability to lift his trunk up onto the rack overhead. So he made do with putting it on the floor and pulling out a book on magical cartography. It had always been rather an interest of his, reading maps. Since he wasn't allowed to visit anywhere he would read stories about other places and spend entire evenings pouring over maps of foreign lands.

He tried to stay awake, he really did, due to the fact that he was worried about what people would think about him falling asleep on the train. His mother had told him to make friends, but his father had warned him against getting close to anyone. So he supposed that he should only make friends with children who wouldn't ask questions, and seclude himself a little. With that last thought he fell off to sleep, only to be awoken several hours later.

~Cesso~

James Potter was bored. Although he had just met a fellow troublemaker (of the Black family!) and had Peter to talk to, he was bored. Some Ravenclaw 2nd year girls had arrived in his compartment a few minutes after the greasy git and the red-head had left, and all they wanted to do was talk about girl stuff. Ugh. They had fawned over Sirius and him, and awed at Peter. It was so annoying it was all James could do not to just leave. Actually though, he did just leave. He excused himself to go to the bathroom, but really left in search to find another compartment. After a bit of exploring he found one that only had one person in it, some sleeping kid, and hurried back to extract Sirius and Peter.

James burst back into the compartment, interrupting some girls absolutely fascinating story, startling everyone else.

"Peter! Sirius!" He shouted, causing a blond girl to squeal in surprise. "I found him!" He turned to the leader of this small clan of Ravenclaws and said "Sorry, but we've been looking for a friend of ours all morning. Now we need to go meet him, but thanks for talking to us for so long."

Once the three were out in the hallway Sirius gave him a high-five and shouted in joy quite loudly, and congratulated James on an ingenious escape.

"So where is this compartment?" Peter said, "and whose this friend of ours?"

James grinned wide, showing all of his pearly whites. "I have no clue who he is, but he's sleeping. Onward!"

When the three arrived at the compartment they let themselves in quietly, taking great pains not to wake up the sleeping boy. James noticed the trunk on the floor and motioned to Sirius to help him hoist it overhead, along with the trunks the three had dragged with them. The three sat on the floor then, playing a game of exploding snap, only whispering. Even when the snack lady arrived they were quiet, and shushed at her for being too loud. The three didn't even know the boys name yet, but they had already taken on the role of protectors. Something about his slight frame and short stature conjured up a sense of brotherly protection that none of them knew that they had, and all would vehemently deny if ever asked. It was only several hours later, when the sky began to get dark and a prefect stopped by to warn them that they had about two hours until they reached Hogwarts, did they wake the sleeping boy.

~Cessare~

One thing that Peter Pettigrew was good at was observing others. This talent of his was often overlooked however, due to his tendency to get flustered when asked questions or put in a situation where several people were listening to him. But in every situation he was put in, he continued to observe and collect information about every person he met. James, he decided, was loud. He wasn't loud to seek attention though, he simply was loud because that was how he was. The attention was just an added bonus. He was very amiable, but judged quickly leaving very little point in arguing with him. Sirius was a whole other story though. He didn't really care to be loud, he was only loud to get attention, being loud was what he had taught himself to do. Peter had observed this particular trait as he argued with some member of his family(cousin?) about being allowed to sit with other children his age, he had been loud to cause a spectacle, and he had won the argument. Rather effective if you asked Peter, but he supposed no one planned to ask him.

When James had first brought the two into the new compartment Peter had immediately started observing and judging the sleeping boy. He first noticed the scars on the boys hands, and noticed that even though the train was plenty warm he was shivering in his sleep. He slept fitfully, though that seemed to have nothing to do with the noise level of exploding snap, it seemed more to do with something else, something harder to guess then noise levels. Peter decided that he would have to think about that one more, maybe it had something to do with the locations the train passed? Either way, he was confused and decided to ignore the fact.

A prefect came into the room, and Peter decided that he was irritated. Probably at having to preform prefect duties rather then spend time with his friend. Peter deduced that he probably had been planning a game before he had to go and talk to the first years, since he held a pack of cards in his left hand. As soon as the prefect left James announced that they needed to wake the sleeping boy, and looked around expectantly.

"I'll do it." Sirius offered, then saying "How do you wake someone up without jumping on them?"

James snorted, and then thought. "I dunno..maybe just shake his shoulder or something? Throw water on his face? Talk loudly?"

"I think the shaking his shoulder is a good plan" Peter suggested, but he was at as much of a loss as the other two. "But be careful, it looks like his shoulder might hurt him. Maybe you should shake his left arm?"

The two started at Peter in something akin to amazement, and confusion.

"How do you know that?" Sirius asked.

"See the way he's sleeping on his side, with his right arm curled up a little? He probably hurt it and doesn't want to put his weight on it."

"Do you notice this kind of thing a lot?" James asked, his eyes shining with something Peter couldn't identify.

"I suppose so.." Peter trailed off, a little uncomfortable being held under such scrutiny.

"Brilliant!" Sirius exclaimed, as he walked over to the sleeping boy and slowly shook his left shoulder.

~Cese~

As Sirius Black shook the sleeping boy's shoulder, the first thing he noticed was how small he was. His shoulder seemed to weight nothing. Of course when he had first seen the boy he had noticed that the boy was small, in a sickly sort of way, but he hadn't thought much about it. But now that Sirius was shaking his shoulder he was struck with the knowledge that this boy was very small, painfully so. Sirius wished that he had had the foresight to save some sweets from the trolley for him.

The boy awoke with a start, his eyes wide and afraid, as though being awoken from sleep was something worrisome and someone may hurt him soon. His wide eyes took in the sight of the boys and cards littered on the floor and he relaxed visibly, his breathing slowing and straitening himself on the bench.

"Bonjour!" Sirius said, sticking his hand in the boys, and shaking it with much vigor. He rather enjoyed using French, his mother had insisted that he learn it from a young age. Sirius used it often around other people often due to the fact that it confused them, but he botched his words and pronunciations around his family as often as he could. It was an agreeable sort of condition he supposed.

"Hullo" the sleeping boy, now awoken, replied. He still looked a little shocked to see so many others where he had previously been secluded.

"James Potter" James said, offering the boy a chocolate frog, "the rude French one is Sirius, and he's Peter." This was accompanied with a punch in the shoulder from Sirius, and a jab towards Peter.

"Remus Lupin..." The sleeping boy, Remus apparently, replied. He took the chocolate frog and gave James a weak smile. Sirius got the impression that he didn't get out much, though he supposed that Remus was the agreeable sort, and Sirius immediately challenged James to a thumb war in response to the "rude French one" comment.

"So how long have I been sleeping? When did lot get here?" Remus asked, ignoring the shouts of James and Sirius, it seemed he decided that it was best just to continue as though nothing happened.

"I have no clue how long you slept, but we all got here when Ravenclaws invaded our old compartment. About 2 hours I suppose?" Sirius asked, while tackling James.

"What house d'you think you'll be in?" James asked Remus, apparently the fiasco that this question had caused last time hadn't fazed James at all.

"I'm not really sure, I'm just glad I can go to Hogwarts at all.." Remus trailed off again, biting his lip as though in deep thought. "You?"

"We're all going to Gryffindor!" James replied, and Sirius felt a wave of relief that James had decided he was worthy of something more than being Slytherin scum. "I suggest you join us there! Are you muggle-born or something? Why so glad you can come?"

Sirius' interest was piqued now as well, he didn't think the boy was muggle-born since he vaguely recognized the surname Lupin. In fact...

"No, Lupin's a pureblooded surname, right? Your dad married a muggle though, right?"

Remus looked shocked that someone would know that, and James and Peter were giving him curious looks as well.

"Right." Remus replied after a short bit, "My Mum's a muggle. How do you know?"

"I have the creepiest family. Ever!" Sirius proclaimed, wishing now that he hadn't said anything, it would appear that knowing all pureblooded surnames wasn't a talent widely recognized. "Do you play exploding snap?"

~Cesser~

The four boys exited the train, looking around in confusion as where to go. A booming voice started calling for the first years to come though, and the boys situated themselves into one boat, with a large bit of splashing from Sirius and James.

"Knock it off!" Remus reprimanded, "You'll tip the boat. I don't fancy getting wet you know."

No sooner had he said that then the boat actually did tip, and the four found themselves treading water.

"I can't swim" Peter wailed.

"Here grab my arm Pete" James called, swimming over to where Peter was. "Sirius, you all right mate?"

"I'm fine, Remus are you ok?" Sirius asked. After a moment of silence he asked again, "Remus?"

"Oi, Lupin where are you?" James shouted. The boys could no longer see any of the other boats, and it seemed that no one had noticed their spill.

"Remus Lupin!" Sirius called, and the three boys began chanting his name and trying to find him.

"I'm all right, don't worry. I got our boat back. I don't know how you managed it but it almost sunk, and it drifted quite a bit away." Remus' reappearance, along with the boat's return, caused large shouts from James and Sirius, and a muted cry from Peter.

They all piled in, and finally they saw the castle, all emitting the expected gasps of excitement and awe. They scrambled out of the boat when it finally reached the castle, noticing no other first years were around anymore, and ran to the front doors, Remus struggling to keep up and Peter protesting loudly.

"..might want to freshen..." a witch was saying as they opened the doors, soaking wet and startling the rest of the first years, their appearance cutting off the witch's speech.

"Hullo" James and Sirius said in tandem, flashing her identical grins.