Where are we going?" Severus asked me for the umpteenth time. I think. I wasn't really paying attention. My own focus was set on the changing staircases.
"Stop worrying!" James Potter remarked, clapping the Slytherin on the back, almost causing him to fall off the staircase at that.
Whatever their complaints, I was surprised the three were still following me.
"Well, I hardly had a choice given you dragged-"
"James."
"On it." My new best friend echoed out,clasping one hand over the Slytherin's mouth. This time to no avail, given the Slytherin's sudden change of position.
"You will stop that-"
"Remus."
The aforementioned, quiet, werewolf did not in fact oblige me.
He clearly needed more training.
Still, without a missed beat, I simply kept on going. James and Remus at my heel, with Severus just behind us. A longing look to his face.
Honestly. If it was really that much of a problem, why he hadn't outright left was a question all-
"I don't know the way back! This staircase has led us around in circles!"
"Really should've thought of that before hitching a ride with us." I remarked without preamble, jumping onto a lower set of stairs. The others, barring James who gave my actions a thoughtful look, settled for walking down like human beings instead.
The plebs.
"I didn't have a choice in the matter..."
"We all have choices, Severus, some of us just miss the checkpoints." I grinned up, watching as James followed my lead. Reaching me before the other two.
"...What does that mean?" Remus, to my surprise, questioned instead. The student for once taking his own initiative!
Alas, I didn't answer him either.
...
The stairs, after near an hour of-
"Ten minutes," James corrected me.
-Hogwarts tomfoolery, had finally led us to where we needed to be.
"This looks like the same corridor we came from." Severus, the evident pessimist, remarked with a drawl. His need of questioning having finally died down.
Maybe that was why the stairs had finally let us out. Snape shutting the hell up.
"...I am starting to think you're not meant to be in Gryffindor." Remus calmly pointed out, eyeing me with a certain sense of... Something. I couldn't quite tell if it was a human expression or a werewolfy one.
"Thank Merlin you're not in my house," Snape whispered more to himself, then the rest of us.
"Hm. Had no idea muggle-raised bores swore using Merlin too."
James, thankfully, held Severus back from overreacting towards me. Though turning my gaze towards him for but a moment, I realized the student hadn't in fact moved at all. Literally.
Severus had just stopped in place.
"...How do you know that?"
"I can read minds." I deadpanned and continued walking on. Completely missing the sheer dread that filled the other student's face.
James Potter on the other hand chose to be the voice of reason.
"Slytherins don't generally come in muggle clothing," James remarked, admittedly somewhat bemused himself.
"Pretty sure I saw a few snakes wearing worse than him."
Considering the sudden silence from my partner in crime, I had a feeling James was starting to lose his patience with me.
"...I am not your partner in crime."
"Not yet."
"...What does that make us then?" Remus asked his second question in the same hour. I was honestly proud.
For his and Snape's sake though, I chose not to answer that one either.
"That is infinitely worse..." Snape remarked, proving he was also capable of reading minds.
The hypocrite.
"Psst," James whispered inconspicuously. Though not low enough to actually work. The hand covering his face not helping either. "You're saying all of that out loud."
"I had a feeling I was." I shrugged, turning the corner. My gaze idly landed on another empty hallway. This time, however, there was a dead-end on the other side. The entire pathway blank, and dull. Without a single portrait nor door to compensate.
Which, of course, meant, I was at the right place!
"Aren't we going to get into trouble for been out late? The headmaster said we were supposed to go to our dorms..." Remus, on a damn roll, asked his third question in the same hour!
"I think that was more of a suggestion."
"It really wasn't."
"...I am inclined to agree with Snape on this one." James remarked, taking me by surprise.
And I thought Pettigrew was meant to be the traitor.
"Peter? The one that went before me? Isn't he in our house too?" James Potter followed through, as if he hadn't just betrayed me for Severus of all people.
"...I am inclined to feel offended."
"I am inclined not to care."
Still, without further ado, I walked up to the blank wall at the end of the hallway and started pacing before it. My needs and wants broadcasted for the whole castle to empathically hear.
To absolutely no effect.
"So. Now what?" Severus remarked with the first hint of his canon smugness. Still, I took it in stride, electing to continue pacing before the clearly bugged wall.
Maybe canon was wrong and I needed to pace a few more times?
"...What's canon?" Remus whispered his question towards James Potter, the only other wizard with any likely knowledge on the matter.
"Long gone." I, however, took the initiative for once and answered the werewolf's question.
...
I wasn't sure how long we'd waited-
"Fifteen minutes."
Thank you, James.
"I think the word you're looking for is wasted," Severus remarked with a gruff. The student currently sat down on the floor against the wall, one hand holding his head up. Clear tiredness radiating out of his form.
"Speaking of wasted," I remarked, idly glancing towards said wizard. I'd stopped pacing before the wall some time ago. Electing the room of requirement as either non-existent or against me in particular.
I'd even had both Remus and James do the same! Though I had a feeling the werewolf only did it because of peer pressure.
James probably, almost definitely, believed me when I told him the castle had a secret room with everything in it.
From Portable Black Holes to Nuclear Warheads.
Absolutely cannot wait to get my hands on all that goodness.
Still, both of their attempts had ended the same way, and Severus didn't look like he intended to follow my instructions which meant, either way, staying here wasn't likely to change much-
It was admittedly subtle. The sudden change in the atmosphere. The way the very air, for a moment, seemed to still at the sudden arrival. The other three, judging by their faces, didn't seem to notice.
"... Hey... Sirius? Are you- I mean do you really plan on becoming a dark lord?" Remus's fifth question, admittedly took me by surprise.
Not for the content- Well, the fact he genuinely avoided the whole 'are you serious' thing was kind of disappointing but that was neither here nor there.
Rather it was the timing of it.
"Do you know what a Dark Lord isRemus?"
"...A bad person?" It was telling that he looked towards James Potter for some kind of reassurance.
"Snape?" I continued on, not missing a beat.
"What?" The student replied, not bothering to even look at me anymore.
"Do you know what a Dark Lord is?"
"Based on you, I'd say it was whoever raised you."
Admittedly, not a bad answer.
"James?"
"A wizard that specializes in the Dark Arts."
It was telling that Severus froze at the sudden answer. And James, to my surprise, seemed to notice.
"Hmm. A question for you all then."
"Wasn't that meant to be one?"
Ignoring Severus's sudden snap, I continued on with my point before it left me. Though the reason I'd even thought of it in the first place seemed to have slipped my mind.
"Who, would you say, between the following two is worse?" I turned to face all three of them.
"The one who uses Dark Magic to coerce and convince people to follow him, on his own personal selfish quest."
Judging by the sudden look that filtered James's face, I had a feeling he was coming to the wrong conclusion.
"Or the one that teaches children to risk their futures fighting said Dark Lord, in the hopes one of them succeeds?" Knowing most of them would die.
I, of course, left the second part unsaid.
The three before me all spared themselves a single glance, before, to my surprise, coming together and choosing the first option. Even if Severus looked like he'd swallowed his tongue doing so. The very atmosphere itself seemed to turn cold for but a moment, even.
"...And," For the first time since I'd met him, James Potter showed hints of wariness as he looked towards me. "Which one do you think is worse?"
Smiling grimly towards, him, I answered.
"The one that refuses to take credit."
Severus, to my surprise, was the first one to get it. A glint practically filling his eyes. The sobering fact that an Eleven-year-old, without my experience could so quickly understand such a thing left a sour taste in my mouth.
"...Why?" Remus questioned, admittedly one step-behind. And, I honestly would've answered him, if not for the interruption.
"I must say, that's a rather interesting view,"
The voice, of course given the dead end, came from behind us. The tone and nature of it familiar enough to freeze my unwilling companions.
"Is it because they get away with it?" Albus Dumbledore remarked, a verycurious expression on his wizened face.
"Nah, getting away with it is fine. Doing it again is the problem." My question seemed to raise a single, white-coloured, eyebrow.
I don't think Albus Dumbledore likes me very much.
"You seem to assume much, don't you Mr Black?"
"Well, these days you just never know, really. What with all the fanon out there."
"...Be that as it may, I do believe it is bedtime for-"
"If I don't make it to breakfast, you know who to blame." I deadpanned towards James, earning a facepalm from him in return.
Severus chose that moment to finally find a sense of humor and snort.