Hi all, so I am back to this wonderful fandom with a new story! I am taking a delve into a fandom, an era and a couple that has always fascinated me and it's the James/Lily era.

This is the second part of the story that started in the Beginning of the End and these are the moments in the first Wizarding War and the build up to Harry.

This story will be twenty chapters long and some events/events that do take place might be missed.

Also spelling/grammar...not my best thing. Again keep that in mind when you read...please.

Disclaimer-Nothing here is mine.

Please Read and Review.

And on a side note, I like so many other Fanfiction Authors no longer receive notifications via email about reviews/PMs etc. So if you do send any it might be a while, if ever before I get back to you. Please keep that in mind for it is not intentional-If anyone has a fix please let me know

I do not receive PMs anymore, if you have a question stick it in a review and I will answer it in the chapter notes.

The End Of The Beginning

Chapter 2-Hard Landing.

Living together and living apart brings many challenges as the Order's actions come close to home. James is thinking about somethings. So is Peter.

After the meeting they all staggered back to their small flats on the outskirts of Diagon Ally. James had refused to moved back home to his parents house claiming the house needed a break from him and he needed a break from the house. Sirius was unsure what to make of that but he had dutifully packed up his bags. His great-uncle had left him some cash and that was enough with what James had to float Remus a cheaper rent in such a way that he never had to realise that was what they were doing.

Lily and Marlene had also taken the flat opposite. Sirius knew that both Lily and Marlene wouldn't have had a problem living with them (God knows they over here so many times it practically was like living with them but the truth of the matter was that they had a stuck up old biddy for a landlady who didn't approve of so many teenagers in one place living and working odd hours and coming back sometimes covered in blood or worse and had said they took two apartments and slept in them at night or she was slinging them out.

That didn't matter all that much, just meant that they had to get creative. But with all the odd and long hours they were doing for the Order it was less getting creative and more just trying to find five fucking minutes where they could get to sleep.

And sleeping now was hard.

Nightmares you see.

It was not the work. Sirius didn't mind the work, he could do the work it was just all the bureaucracy that came with it. He was a man of action, he didn't do well at meetings and planning stuff out to the last second, he needed to feel the wand in his hand, to feel the magic that was coursing through his veins, to look his enemy in the eye and know that it was do or die, kill or be killed.

He didn't do well cooped up all the time.

James knew that about him. So did Marlene, so did Lily who he was finding despite their differences over the years (you know the whole her spending six years repeatedly crushing his best friends heart over and over again until it was nothing but a mangled mess on the floor) he was becoming firm friends with. He liked the day to day work that they did around the small flat turning it from an utter dump into something that resembled a home. He liked coming back to see his girlfriend or his girlfriends best friend cooking something, he liked to know that Marlene was safe both before and after he came back from a mission.

It was the little things that he was finding so precious in the days as the world slid from being aware of a war brewing to a full time war brewing. He had been aware of it since before Mary but it was a wonder sometimes how the ministry seemed to only realise that it was happening when it directly affected the ratings of whatever Government was in charge at the time.

As much as Sirius loathed to give anyone like Barty Crouch Sr credit (especially when he knew that the man's parenting style made his own parents look cute and cuddly) he knew that he at the very least saw the signs coming and was prepared to fight.

The work for the order was hard and it usually involved doing dangerous and often stupid stuff which is why Sirius thought that he and the rest of the Marauders were good at what they did. Edgar Bones who had more connections within the Ministry than the rest of them did put together, had managed to snag his hands on a list of high powered muggle-borns that it was clear the Death Eaters were going to target and they tried to make them either go into hiding or at the very least put in place a decent amount of protection—that was what everyone was doing but Remus—Sirius didn't know what Remus was doing for long weeks at a time at Dumbledore's request and he knew better than to ask but when he saw the state his friend was in when he eventually did manage to get home he knew enough to know that it was bad.

And it was taking it's toll.

Remus was still asleep when James and Sirius entered their flat and Peter was sat at the counter doing figure of eight movements in his soup and clearly thinking about something.

"Your up tonight Wormy…no more covering" Sirius said flatly. He had some sympathies with Peter as when he had met his mother she had always seemed very kind if not a little snobbish. But then again he was a Black and he saw snobbery where others did not so perhaps it was just him with that one, but enough was enough. He had to eat, he had to sleep and he had to kiss Marlene.

Peter nodded eyes still down in his soup and James elbowed him disapprovingly.

"Pete how's your Mum doing?"

Peter looked up at them his eyes hazy with…something and then he seemed to remember. Sirius didn't understand, he didn't understand it but then again…you only had one mother and he had loathed his from the day he had escaped from her womb until the day that she had croaked his last.

Carefully he did not think of his mother. Thinking of his mother meant thinking of Reg and thinking of Reg was painful because the reality was while he had all but skipped out of school to join the Order, Reg who was one year behind him had probably done the same thing but to join the Death Eaters.

"My mum is fine" Wormtail said quietly and Sirius nodded. James did not look one hundred percent convinced but then again that was James who was now opening their fridge.

One of the perks of having a muggle born for a friend Sirius had decided, was that she was able to introduce them to the wonderful world of muggle booze. He had never known a think called Larger before but Lily had come home one day after a brutal chase by the Lestrange brothers with a crate of the stuff, a black eye, a split lip and a giddy James who had found a muggle supermarket with it's trollies and it's 'buy one get one half price' utterly fascinating.

"You know" he said as Lily had used an old fashioned thing to open the bottles instead of her wand and had passed them all around—complete with a bag of chocolates for Remus who immediately began examining the party selection with more intent than he had done with his schoolwork—and that was saying something.

"They don't even use magic to keep the fridges cool for the fresh stuff. It's just…cold"

Sirius had found he rather enjoyed the taste of muggle beer especially if the bottle was freezing and so he took the bottle James gave him and drank greedily.

"You two know it's six in the morning don't you?" came a voice and the three of them turned to see Remus stood there looking like…well…if hell was an emotion Sirius was sure that Mooney would be the definition of it right now.

"Yes I do" Sirius said dragging another swig from his bottle and then setting it down on the little kitchen island.

"Anyone seen my lighter?"

"Seriously? The place stinks like an ash tray on a good day" Remus said shaking his head. Sirius just grinned.

"Where are the girls?"

"I think they said something about a shower" James said running a hand through his hair and wincing as he pulled what looked like a twig out of it. "Merlin knows I understand the theory, it was a shit show last night, couldn't get near any of them and then when they were done they turned their attention onto the muggles in the street and had what can only be described as a fucking party with them" he shook his head in disgust and Sirius nodded. There was very little that either one of them could say about last night and quite frankly he didn't want to get into it. Already what he had seen and what he had done was ingrained in his brain forevermore. And this was after six months of being in the Order. What was he going to be like in a year? Five? What was he going to be like if in fifteen years time they were still fighting the same good old, unwinnable fight?

Because Sirius Black could never say and (and if truth be told he didn't even like to think it) but sometimes it really did feel like he and his friends were fighting an unwinnable war.

"I was thinking" James said picking apart his label and running a hand down the cool length of the bottle staring at it with an intensity Sirius had only ever seen that one time Lily had worn a pink bra under her shirt (and James had promptly knocked Professor Flitwick into a coat of armour in shock).

"Oh dear Merlin the five minute warning" Remus said with a small smile as he sat gingerly on the counter and took a bottle from Sirius.

James pulled a face but let it go.

That should have been the first warning that what James was about to tell him was momentous.

But somehow nothing could prepare the three other men at the table for the bombshell that was about to come out of their eighteen year old friends mouth.

"I was thinking about asking Lily to marry me"

Sirius inhaled half of his beer straight up his nose and then straight back out again. Peter dropped his spoon splattering cold soup everywhere and Remus blinked before whipping out his wand and making sure that the area was clean which was such a fucking Remus thing to do.

Seriously Voldemort could be at the door and Remus would probably make sure that flat was tidy before letting him blast his way clear.

"YOUR THINKING OF DOING WHAT!"

"Shout a little bit louder Padfoot I'm pretty sure Lily didn't hear that" James hissed running to the door, hand to Merlin's saggy arse cheek, he looked through the peephole.

"James are you for real?" Moony asked quietly. "You've only just turned eighteen"

"I will be nineteen when I get married. Witch Weekly says it takes about a year to do it right"

"Witch…MERLIN WEPT"

"Padfoot I swear on my favourite Quidditch team I will kick you to high heaven if you don't shut up."

Sirius caught Remus's eye and knew they were both thinking the same thing.

Fortunately it was Peter that asked.

"Did you knock her up?"

"NO" James hissed emphatically shaking his head.

"I just…we love each other…and with everything that is going on why shouldn't we be able to prove it?"

"You want a legitimate answer to that" Sirius said quietly. "You shouldn't marry someone because your afraid of dying. Besides what makes you think she'll even say yes."

"I am not marrying her because I am afraid of dying" James hissed. "I've thought about marrying her since I turned fourteen, I know she's it for me. And I hope that I'm it for her but I…I love her…I really, really love her and I want to be with her for the rest of my life. And I thought you lot would support me not stand there gaping at me like I've lost my mind"

And with that he took the beer and disappeared into his room slamming the door shut. Sirius blinked at the depth of feeling in his tone and he turned to look at Peter and Remus, Moony shrugged but Wormtail had turned back to his soup spoon and he said to the depths of his bowl.

"I hate this fucking war" and then he was gone too.

"You're on duty tonight" Sirius called after him but all he got was a shut door. Remus shot him a reproachful kind of look.

"What?"

"I love you like a brother Padfoot but you have to admit tactfulness has not been your strongest suit"

"What the hell did I do?" he asked looking around for some kind of validation.

Remus smiled at him.

"James didn't us to tell him all the ways that his plan could go wrong" he said softly. "He just needed us to shut up and listen"

And with that he hopped off the counter and went to the candy cupboard. Sirius saw him take a large bar of muggle chocolate with peanuts in it and he went back to his room leaving Sirius alone in the tiny kitchen.

He needed to go and find Marlene, she would understand this shit.

Come to think of it first he would take a shower, he needed to scrub the stench of death of his skin.

Peter wasn't wrong, these days it was very easy to hate and Sirius knew there was not one person who wasn't on the other side of this war, that didn't hate it and the consequences.

And the hits were still gonna just keep coming.

And yeah, there we go, I hope you enjoy.

Next Chapter-Peter Pettigrew contemplates loss, love and life as he makes the decision to turn traitor (Peter centric chapter) Potential time jump.