Chapter 8: Runes

'What in the name of Merlin's saggy ball is that?'

James turned to Amy and with a great sparkle in his eyes, grinned sheepishly. Now came the awkward part that James could never seem to explain properly first time round: it always ended up in him stuttering, digressing and then stuttering some more before finally just settling for 'I'm an alien and so's my dad and this is our spaceship'. He didn't have to do it often, but despite his relatively young age, he had had his fair share of introductions, most of them ended up with someone laughing at him and then asking if he remembered the number for the hospital or whether he needed any help. Suffice to say, he had good reason to be awkward.
'Well, this is the TARDIS. I live in it with my dad who's somewhere else right now and in fact, this isn't even the TARDIS, it's just an impression because a TARDIS isn't just a room that springs up randomly, it requires lots of different conditions all to be acting at the same time; near on impossible which is why THIS SHOULDN'T BE HAPPENING!' James whipped round to face Amy who had been standing in shocked silence as James prattled on about this, that and the other. Amy shrugged and whispered.
'It's magic-'
'Yes! That much is disturbingly clear. Have you seen this before? Do you know what it is? Have you any idea how this is here? This cannot be good!'
'I have seen it before, but I haven't at the same time. I feel like I should remember but I don't. And as for how it got here: I have no clue, I thought it was dependant on will power rather than 'conditions'.' Amy smirked as James paced back and forth, repeatedly running his hand through his hair as he muttered to himself. Suddenly he said something Amy assumed to be a swear word (it sounded like a collection of sounds to her ears) and then turned to her, his eyes flashing blue with flecks of swirling gold.
'I need you to stay here, don't follow me in and definitely do not tell anyone I'm in here but don't leave. That is of vital importance!' James said sternly before pulling an appalled face, 'Oh Rassilon, I'm turning into my dad! I'm becoming- I'm becoming BORING!'
Amy just stared.
'Anyway, I'm going to nip in, see what's occurring and then would you like to- would you like to come in with me?'
Amy gave him a sceptical look. 'You're just a first year, I'm older than you. Shouldn't it be me risking my life to venture into a TARDIS that could be potentially unstable?'
'I may look like just a mere first year but boy, can I survive!' James laughed as he ran his fingers along the smooth wood of the TARDIS door, his eyes taking in every scrape, gash and fleck before pushing and opening the door, revealing the TARDIS in all its beauty. Soft light glowed from inside, illuminating everything. James walked along the walkway to the control panel where he stopped.
It had been a month since he had last seen the TARDIS or his dad, a month since he had felt truly happy; it was not such an issue as James would have to leave the TARDIS to travel on his own at some point, but after his latest expedition, he couldn't foresee that occurring any time soon. The wizarding world was a brilliant one but James couldn't help but feel slightly outcast by his unnatural nature- well, perceived unnatural nature, to him it was perfectly normal. He was pretty sure Sirius would blow a gasket if and when he found out!
'Hey Sexy, it's me, James!' He whispered into the still air, his hold body tentative to any slight movement in the TARDIS or indeed, the vortex. It was the slight whirring sound that alerted James to the waking of the TARDIS.
'Oh, it's good to be back,'
James stroked the control panel softly before pressing numerous buttons and flicking copious numbers of switches in earnest hope. 'Come on, you've got to work. You're here, aren't you?!' James pumped the charges again, his fringe falling into his eyes as he desperately reset the control panels before trying again.
'You've got to work! I've got to get home to dad. You need to work!' James cried out, tears welled in his eyes as he resorted to his last hope: linking himself directly to the vortex to try and drag himself and the TARDIS through.
'Sexy, I'm so sorry but I've got to get home- please, forgive me for what I'm about to do.'
With a parting glance to the controls, James raced down the steps and towards the core, his hearts racing as he manually unlocked the casing, revealing a large glowing mass that thrummed with energy. James oh so slowly dipped his hand into the swirls of gold, blue and silver and held a strand in his hand, his eyes glowing as he removed the strand from the bundle. Carefully, he walked back up to the controls and placed the strand in a vial which had appeared next to him, a small reminder of the Room's ambiance, and entered the time co-ordinates to where he believed his father would be: Cardiff, 2301. Resigned to his oncoming task, James pushed a needle from the control pad that had held place ever since his father had used it to work out his species into his arm and with one final breath picked up the vial and linked it to the needle which injected the time strand into him.
He had not anticipated the extreme pain that would follow.
It was like a burning fire flowing through his veins, but then not stopping at his veins and arteries but forging new paths through his body, breaking down every cell, every fibre of his being and stitching it back up again just the same as before but with more purpose. The pain intensified and James couldn't help but let out a small whimper that grew and grew into sobs of agony which became screams of guy wrenching torture. It was worse than staring into the Vortex when he was a child, it was worse than the starvation of the forest, it was new and all consuming and terrifying.
Suddenly the pain collapsed and James felt a needle being ripped from his flesh, he opened his eyes which he hadn't realised had clamped shut and he saw an worried pair of brown ones. Then the hurt started again, like a ghost the pain flew through his body leaving him a whimpering kid again.
'What on earth were you doing? We need to get you to Madame Pompernick!' the voice which James recognised through the haze of pain as Amy's said. James batted her away.
'No-'
'You're obviously ill, what were you doing?'
'Seeing if it'd work. And you can't take me to her!'
Amy scoffed, 'Why ever not? She is the school nurse,'
'Yes, but can you imagine the questions she'd ask?' James said as forcefully as he could, his breathing was laboured and all he could focus on was the abysmal attempt at time travel he had just made. Amy stood silently and watched him, her eyes following James' every move as she thought of the best possible plan. The issue was getting James up and out of this large, bleeping and whirring room to somewhere she could help him safely without some entering and asking awkward questions... Then she realised.
'We're in the Room of Requirement!'
James looked at her, a strange glint in his eye and he took in what she said.
'It changes to your desires, see now?' Amy laughed as she watched James' face contort from confusion to happy understanding. In James' defence for his unusually slow uptake, he had just almost killed himself trying to drag an almost time machine through the vortex.
Amy scrunched up her face and with a look of utmost concentration, urged the room to change into a medical area complete with text books.
'So, what next?' James asked from a white chair in the centre of the almost bleach white room. Strange knives and other bits of stainless steel equipment were littered around the room on trays along with swabs and bandages leaving a rather weighty atmosphere in the room. It was rather disorientating, actually, the sheer level of light around the room which seemed to come from every possible angle and leave no dark corners. In fact, to James with his heightened eyesight that came with being a Gallifreyan, it was near blinding.
'Next, I make sure you're not dying and then I stop the pain in your chest.'
'Seriously, it's fine! A numbing potion will do just fine, promise,' James grinned, trying to prevent Amy from seeing his obvious discomfort. Amy merely raised an eyebrow.
'You are by no means 'fine'. A numbing potion I can agree on but I think it's deeper than that. Perhaps a strong painkiller?'
'Oh God yes!'

'30th November.
So, Amy (this really nice girl two years above me) showed me the Room of Requirement today! It responds to your will and creates a room in accordance with it which is quite intriguing because that also means that it holds the capability to form a TARDIS, or what looks like one.
I don't know how she got into a room in a magic school but however it did, it doesn't work. I injected time vapours from the core into my arm and used my time travel abilities to try and drag myself through time, unfortunately it didn't work and I ended up almost regenerating. Now that would have been awkward.
Amy hasn't asked me too much about the matter but I think it's only a matter of time until she does. She's smart and I think she realises something's not quite right with me as a human- is it bad that I'm proud I'm different? Anyway, Amy is definitely an enigma, especially since she seems to recall seeing the TARDIS before... Not entirely sure how that works, but somehow it does... '

James curled up in one of the arm chairs by the fire, 'Notable Runes and Wards' in one hand and a cup if steaming tea in the other. It had been two days since the TARDIS incident and James still hadn't fully shaken off the after effects; he was often found lying in bed soothing a headache or a spazzing heart by his dorm mates, two of which were desperately worried for him.
Sirius and Remus had not taken the news of James' incident well, they believed it to be the result of a backfired spell after James felt he wanted no one else to know what he had attempted bar Amy who had a rough idea of what had occurred, but it was proving difficult as Sirius especially had a wide curious streak. It was only an hour ago that Sirius had interrogated him once again on which spell he had used; James' answer remained the same (a pain killing spell that actually had the opposite effect) but Sirius kept digging further until James had taken to avoiding Sirius when he wasn't surrounded by others. He loved Sirius already like a brother but some things weren't meant to be said at that time.
'Hey! Potter!' It was a third year by the name of Alison Hornung that broke James from his intense reading session.
'Yes?'
'Black and Lupin are looking for you. Black says it's urgent. They're by the lake,'
James snapped his book shut and quickly left the common room, his mind running riot with the endless possibilities of what may have occurred. In fact, his mind was so absorbed in the matter that he ran into no less than three students, two teachers on his travels and landed himself with a caution for running (James was indignant that it was fast walking). When he finally arrived at the Black Lake, his cheeks were red and he looked flustered.
'What's the matter?' James called out as he ran over to the huddle of First Years. Sirius was the first to speak.
'Well, it's just Peter's only gone and convinced McKinnon that I like her and I really don't. She's nice but I'd much prefer to go out with Sophie. Anyway, we need to work out how we foil Peter's plan-'
Peter squawked, James just rolled his eyes.
'My idea is a good one! Besides, you were the one who said you were lonely!'
'Did not!'
'Did too!'
'Sirius, you did say you were lonely-' Remus said calmly, his mouth curled up in a small smile as he watched the bickering teens.
'As a JOKE!'
'Still said it!' Peter poked his tongue out at Sirius who just glared.
'Moving on!' James laughed as he watched the pair, 'Maybe you should just play it cool, Siri?'
'Yeah, and if the worst comes to the worst, we can say actually it was James who liked her!' Remus laughed, his eyes alight as he watched James' face turn from one of amusement to one of horror!
'McKinnon and ME?' He gasped, his eyes wide.
'Yes McKinnon and you. You'd get on great!' Remus sniggered, his mind running wild at the possibilities.
'But I can't date someone like her! I'm mean, I'm- and she's-'
'You're a boy and she's a girl? Good observation Jamesy!' Sirius laughed boisterously at his own joke. James just glared.
'That wasn't what I meant.'
'Well? What did you mean then?'
'I meant that I'm not exactly suitable for human dating,' James mumbled, he lowered his eyes to avoid looking at any of the three boys who were all looking at him in shock as he shuffled his feet nervously. Sirius tried to get the words out he wanted to say, to let James realise it was a joke and that there wasn't an issue, but the almost guilty look on James' face made him stop.
'What do you mean, James?' Peter asked, his eyes wide as he watched the twelve year old going on two hundred.
'It's nothing, just McKinnon shouldn't date me, for her sake more than anything else...'
'James, is it because you're a parselmouth? Because if it is, no one cares! I mean, personally, I think it's cool!' Sirius beamed in an attempt to cheer him up; he smiled a small smile. But it was the most fake his smile had ever been. It was one that screamed 'LIAR!' but James truly couldn't face the possibility that someone else would reject him for what he was. Sirius seemed so wrapped up in the possibility that that was the worst that James could be that James couldn't bring himself to tell the truth. Once again, the lie was preferable to the truth and James hated himself for it. If he was going to go along with this crazy idea of a plan, then he was going to do it properly.
'You mean it? Most people don't like what's not normal and we all know I'm not the definition of normal-'
Remus sighed in amusement as Sirius waved a flamboyant hand, 'Please, James, you appeared in my back garden and looked seventeen, then you revealed you were a parselmouth before having a heart attack thing in the dorm last night: I think we've squared away you're not normal,'
'And we still like you!' Remus chipped in, his voice tinted with a tone James couldn't quite place.
After that unexpected reiteration that being normal was, indeed, overrated, James and the rest of the group receded to the edge of the forest where they endeavoured to find some form of magical beast, but to no avail; the closest any of them got to finding such a creature was Sirius when he excitedly found a slow worm but thought it a basilisk, Remus quickly told him so, much to James' amusement as Sirius looked like he'd made a world changing discovery in the secluded forests of Scotland. It was late afternoon by the time they returned to the castle, muddy with the odd leaf stuck in their hair; as Amy later pointed out, James' hair looked like a nest with various pieces of foliage poking out. James, much to Remus' obvious amusement, had the decency to blush.
As dinner came and went and the boys prepared for a good night's sleep, James couldn't help but notice Remus' incessant twitching. Remus had large bags under his pink rimmed eyes and his breath sounded wheezy.
'You alright, Remy?' James asked from where he was pulling his pj shirt on, carefully hiding a large scar running down his side from an incident with some alien creature.
'Yeah, just tired I guess. I got a bit if a headache so I think I may go and see Madame Pompernick and her trainee healer. See you soon guys, and don't worry if I don't come back before you're asleep,' Remus packed his books away into his bag and placed it carefully under his bed, his eyes never leaving his homework planner and diary. James jumped up to offer to go with Remus to the Hospital Wing but Remus just shook his head with a small tired smile.
Once Remus had gone, Sirius erupted with questions.
'Do you think Remus is okay, James? He looked pretty rough earlier today but nothing like that... Do you think it was just a headache? Or do you think it was-'
James interrupted saving the dorm from Sirius' ramblings, 'Siri, I'm sure he's fine! He's probably just got a headache,'
'Yeah, but he said he was tired and then he said he had a headache and then he left and- and- and-'
'Merlin Sirius! I know. I wouldn't worry, besides, even if he were ill, Pompernick would fix him up in a jiffy!' Sirius sighed before nodding and climbing onto his bed, his legs tucked underneath his duvet; James gave him a small smile before doing the same.
It wasn't long until the dorm fell silent with the exception of a few gentle snores and snuffles; they had all dropped off one by one until only James remained, watching the stars and moon from his bed. The full moon glowed from behind a veil of clouds, highlighting the forest beneath it, giving it a rather prettily sinister appearance. Tall pines were illuminated by beams of light, painting the perfect scene of stars and moon, but with one sudden howl, all peace was lost as birds flew into the air in a mad rabble of noise, all desperately flying somewhere else. James sat up sharply, his ears pricking as he watched the birds fly in circles above the forest; an howl like that was not uncommon in a forest so what had been the real reason for such a disturbance to the still night? James asked himself. The only animal that James could possibly think of was some sort of magical creature, but the only magical creature that howled was a wolf and one on the full moon must be a- a werewolf.
And suddenly, everything fell into place.
Remus, the werewolf, was a younger version of Jack Evans, the elder werewolf. They looked similar, they both were werewolves and were friends with a James and a Peter. James knew he had recognised Remus' core? (Was that what James could feel with people?) somewhere before! How quaint, James decided, his mind pleased at his discovery but not so pleased about the knowledge of Remus' looming future.
Another howl wracked the night air, sending a shiver down every awake being's spine as it broke through the previous peace of darkness. It was an unearthly sound, one that held no place in the comings and goings of the world, one that should have been long forgotten in the midsts of time. The science behind a werewolf was nearly unexplored as wizards: a) didn't understand the true nature of science like Gallifreyans did and b) wanted nothing to do with such 'dirty blood'; all in all, it wasn't such a good combination.
Sirius stirred as another howl sounded, he looked up blearily to search for the disturbance; seeing James, he lay back down and muttered something about 'wolves' and 'nargles' before going back to sleep leaving James smiling at his unconscious friend.
It was all great and well that Remus was a werewolf, but how in earth was he supposed to breach the matter? James supposed he should just wait for the others to figure it out, admittedly with Peter that could be years in the future but James was pretty certain Sirius would work it out sooner rather than later. With a small frown, James fell into a fitful sleep.

Three days passed after the full moon and Remus was returned to near full health, only a few cuts and scrapes which he claimed came from falling over on the way back from the hospital wing littered his arms and torso but they were swiftly healing and only looked slightly pink. Sirius on hearing this reason rose one eyebrow sceptically, but otherwise remained quiet, ignoring the rest of the explanation, something Remus had been truly grateful for.
Sadly, it seemed that that week was to be a week of secrets and discovery as Remus and Sirius decided to follow James one day to the Room of Requirement and watch him enter when they were supposed to be in the library doing homework, well in Sirius' case anyway, Remus had finished his the night it was set. The two marauders waited outside the Room, their eyes absorbing every speck of information they could about the blue 'Police' door they could before it disappeared. Sirius pulled out a chocolate bar and started unwrapping it as he prepared to wait but on hearing the crinkle of paper and plastic Remus turned round and stared at him.
'What on earth are you doing!' he glared, his eyes narrowed at Sirius and even more so at the delicious bar in front of him, 'We are trying to work out where James goes every day and you are eating 'Mystic Meg's Magical Munch' like there's no tomorrow!'
'But they're so magical,' Sirius groaned, his mouth full of sweet chocolate as he listened to Remus rant.
'We're trying to find out something here. Besides, where'd you even get that from? I mean, you didn't have it earlier this year, we all knew you ran out of chocolate, I think all of Gryffindor knows! So that means you've got it from somewhere else: where?' Sirius stopped, his eyes wide with shock.
'You can have the remainder of this bar as long as you don't tell a soul-'
'You being serious?'
'I always am,' Sirius beamed at his own joke whilst Remus face palmed. Sirius was still beaming five minutes later when Remus had finished the chocolate bar (in record speed) and a door appeared on the wall again. The blue one.
'You think that's where James goes? The 'po-lice' box?' Sirius asked as quietly as his voice went which was even so loud enough to, in Remus' opinion, deafen the Ravenclaws on the other side of the castle.
'Yes, now sh!'
The pair sat and waited for James to exit before they sneaked up to the door and sneaked in; what they saw almost broke their minds. A apparently fully functional TARDIS stood in front of them, a loud whirring sound pulsing every five seconds; for Sirius who had never seen anything like it, it was like when he first laid eyes on Hogwarts all over again.
'It's massive!' he whispered as he walked around the bleeping box in the middle. All the buttons and levers seemed very attractive to Sirius but he dared not touch them lest he blow himself and the school up, something that Remus and James said was only a matter of time until it happened.
'What's so special about this place then?' Sirius said whilst leaping onto a large padded bench on one side of the TARDIS; the seat sagged underneath the sudden weight but quickly bounced up again when Sirius jumped off to visit another seat.
Remus replied, his eyes trailing a series of circles and lines near the ceiling, 'Well, it's not wizarding nor is it muggle... It seems to be some form of machine,'
'Hang on, when you say it's not muggle, you don't mean that it's some alien thing do you?' Sirius' eyes were like plates. Remus shot him an incredulous look.
'No! I know you read that book that Peter gave to you, but truly, it's all fiction and let's face it, do you really believe James is going to be an alien? He's a parselmouth for crying out loud, something inherited through lines; he couldn't not be human!'
Sirius nodded, he looked around the room and couldn't help but notice a small patch of blood on the floor near what looked like the main panel. He leant down and stroked it with his finger, barely recoiling when it dyed his finger a vivid red; he sniffed it and pulled a disgusted face before wiping it back onto the floor.
'It's blood-' he said as Remus watched him rub the remaining blood onto his trouser leg.
'What?! Why?'
'Well, it's not much, barely a couple of drops but it's enough to be used in runic blood magic-' Remus stared at the circles again, he whipped his book out and began to copy the circles down.
'What are you doing?' Sirius asked, his eyebrow cocked.
'Don't you see?! They're runes! James is trying to do a blood ritual and he's using an old form of runes not used by modern society!'
'Hang on- James? blood rituals? Are you off your head? This is James 'let's not do anything reckless today, I'm still recovering from last night' Potter. He doesn't do rituals-' Sirius squawked. Remus stared at him as if in a new light as he explained the ins and outs of James' large personality when it came to various magics. 'Besides, those don't even look like Runes. Maybe James is just into circular interior design,'
Remus had to agree there: they certainly didn't look like Runes but that was the only thing he could conceive them as being. The idea of James conducting illegal activities was mind blowing but although Remus found it hard to believe, he couldn't help but put the pieces of the puzzle together from so far: it seemed James was delving into horrible, mind warping rituals.
He needed more data.

A/N: ITS FINALLY PUBLISHED! Seriously, you have no idea how hard it was for me to get that chapter out! It was like a constant writers block! Anyway, please FFR and etc! we're almost at 200 followers so let's try and hit that mark and way beyond! I think I got 50 or 60 new followers for C7 alone!