James antered the astonomy tower, excited and bloody terrified for Regulus. His Regulus. He scanned the room and didnt see regulus. That was odd. He had seen Regulus on the marauders map at the astronomy tower only a few minutes ago, and had buried the map under his bed sheet so that nobody could see him and regulus together.

Unfortunately, that meant that he simply had to wait and see if Regulus would come, instead of obsessively watching the map.

That also meant that Regulus had left the tower for some reason. James resisted the urge to run away and find him, he needed to trust that Regulus was capable enough at magic on his own to get out of whatever situation had befallen him, which Regulas was, but it couldnt hurt to have an extra set of hands right?

Without thinking it through further, James slid on his invisibility cloak and hurried to look for the most likely place that Reg would be.

Luckily for him, he found Regulus in the first place he looked - the room of requirement.

"Reg?" James asked cautiously as he entered through the door to find Regulus pacing and running his hand through his hair.

As soon as he heard James' voice, Regulus literally jumped. That was bad. It meant that Regulus must have been really stressed and lost in his thoughts. While James still couldnt see his face, Regulus composed his face to a cold and stony look that he usually didn't have on while alone with James.

"Potter." He said, turning around to face 'Potter'

James was confused, and partly hurt at the hard look on the new black heirs face.

"Potter? I thought we were on a first-name basis now; I mean we have-" James found himself without a voice as Regulus silenced him with such a mournful look, breaking the stony facade, he faltered.

"Regulus?" He managed to say after a moments silence. He worried about what had happened during the summer holidays to Reg.

Regulus

He had tried to put on a mean face, and failed. Why James had to bring out that effect on everyone, he didn't know and it frustrated him to no end.

Reg decided he would have to be entirely truthful with James, he deserved to know the truth even if it broke them up.

"This summer" He started. "M-my family" why was Regulus, rightful heir to the noble house of black, stuttering? He could not do this. Oh god he really fucking couldn't. He had to tell James! But the words... oh the words got tumbled in his head oh and he couldn't speak normally anymore and he couldn't think and he couldn't-

"Reg," James said softly to no avail, like trying to calm a hurricane.

"Regulus please" he continued, but no, Regulus couldn't hear, everything was too loud and he wasnt able to think about what words were pouring out of james mouth, he saw more and more words tumble out of James in a panic., but did he hear them? No he couldn't he just couldn't because he wouldn't because he shouldn't and-

"Regulus! Breathe please its going to be okay you dont have to speak just breathe!" James near shouted, someones eyes getting watery, he couldn't tell who's but he just wanted to-

Darkness.

James

As regulus started to fall to the floor, James caught him and felt his heartbeat which was abnormally high.

James didn't have any access to magical pptions right now so he had to resort to the muggle techniques that lily had taught him.

Right, so...

Mouth-to-mouth! He thought he remembered how to do that one. He began the procedure and started seeing if he could remember any others.

That's right! Didn't he need to remove his shirt too, something about his airway being blocked?

James began to remove Regulus' long-sleeved shirt and stared in horror at what lay on Reg's arm. He thought he might throw up. The dark mark lay on Regulus' arm. No. Not his Regulus..it couldnt be. Please not Reg. Not Sirius' brother.

Suddenly the room of requirement began taking care of Regulus itself as James stared in shock at the tatoo.

James' top two feelings were hatred and betrayal. But buried down there was a sense of guilt. He should have saved Regulus from that household. Maybe then he wouldnt have had to- to what? Betray James? Kneel to Voldemort?

But now, James knew.

James knew that Regulus couldn't be saved anymore.

And James left Regulus in the room of requirement, but not before muttering a spell in Regulus' direction that sounded oddly like 'Petrficalous totalous'

No-one kneels to the dark lord on James' watch

.