thoughtformed | [video]

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[video]

[It's Sirius Black, on video, apparently in a good mood. That can't be good.]

I'm interrupting everyone's busy schedule of catching mice and grooming for a very important announcement: It's Harry's birthday tomorrow! Happy Birthday, Harry!

[A wizard with a wand and some fre time on his hands can do a lot of real life sparkles.]

So, I'm not sure how comfortable you are with making this all public, but let's be honest, birthdays are always partly an excuse to publicly embarrass the birthday boy. At least I'm not singing. Yet. I will in a few hours, when it's your actual birthday, I'm just starting early, because you never know what this island will be up to next.

I did however already get you a present and I think I finally managed to work out most of the kinks.

[With that he moves the device to show the gift he made for him.]

I've been working on it for a while now and chances are this one won't break free and evade capture for months on end. Probably. Anyway, I'd like to celebrate. If you don't mind. There's a lot of catching up to do and I have some things to show you.

Everyone else, you should celebrate tomorrow too! It's a great day.

[Private to Sheska and Once-ler]

I need birthday food for a teenage boy and I thought, hey, I know two people very likely to be willing and able to help me out. Against payment of course, Once-ler. Maybe you two could work on it together? [nudge nudge wink wink]

[ooc: Sorry for spamming the comm, but it's HARRY POTTER'S BIRTHDAY, damn it. Also, the image isn't quite right, but you try finding a flying broom that's not a replica of a Harry Potter movie prop.]

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[There had been wards? She hadn't realized... The upper room was of course, quite familiar. She'd spent the better part of a week here, unable to do much for herself and imposing on him terribly while she recovered from that illness earlier this year. There were all sorts of new experiments and things set up since the last time she was year - a lot of potion things, if she was looking at it right. But she hadn't ever seen him bring out that silver basin.

Watching her footing so that she didn't step on anything she shouldn't, she cautiously made her way over to the table, keeping her hands to herself. She'd hate to upset something. As it was, she was afraid she'd upset him over this. Drawing a steadying breath, she stops just out of reach of the basin.]

If you don't want to do this, Sirius, you know that you don't have to. You never have to explain anything if you don't want to.

I know, Sheska. I never in my life did anything but what I wanted to do, until I had no choice left.

[He holds a hand out to Sheska while he sits down by the table himself, tearing his eyes off the silvery liquid to look at her.]

This is a Pensieve. It's a way for a wizard or witch to store memories, to revisit them. Remus left some, before he was released.

[His somber mood sets off little alarm bells, even as she takes his hand and sits with him. She's been so used to seeing him cheery, or at least a little mischievous recently that it feels like a somewhat abrupt backslide into the depression that so haunted him. It probably hasn't actually been all that long, but this goes bone-deep, and she has no idea how to fix it.

The liquid - what was it? It wasn't quicksilver, and it didn't move like water - is mesmerizing, and she finds herself watching it soberly.]

Memories? How...?

It's not that complicated. You just have to keep the memory in mind and then, with a wand, kind of pull it out. It helps when you want to review a situation, see if you missed any details.

I'd show you, but my memories might not... Well, not be quite right.

[He smiles and gives her hand a slight squeeze.]

But if you'd like, I can show you some of what Remus remembered.

[Her fingers tighten around his in return, and she tears her eyes away from the fascinating shimmer to look at him.]

...Is that all right? I mean, it seems awfully intimate somehow. And he hasn't exactly given me permission.

Yeah, no, it's fine. He did it for me. And they're not all that...

It's just, it's better to see than have me talk about it. Mostly because I'm terrible at talking about it these days.

[He shrugs and offers her a smile.]

Are you ready? You can see and hear people, but they can't see or hear us. It will be just a memory, we can watch, but not interact.

Well... If you think it will be all right. How do you do this, then?

[Would it be images in the air? On the liquid's surface? Would they walk into a mist? She has no idea what to do, but she trusts he'll lead her through it all right.]

Just... close your eyes, love. You're not used to magic, that should be easier on you.

[He waits for her to follow the instruction and then he says nothing for a while, until he wraps his arms around her from behind and whispers.]

Open your eyes. Here we are.

[It's the Gryffindor dorm room, it's the room Sirius sees as his home more than anything else. Remus, much younger than he was when he was last in New Moore, is sitting on his bed, reading, while on another bed James very animatedly explains the tactic for a Quidditch game they'd already won to Peter, who listens with a rapt expression.

Sirius is sitting by the window, looking about as handsome as bored.]

That's me.

[Clearly that has to be pointed out.]

About...nine years ago? Maybe.

[Sheska doesn't hesitate, doing as he asks, but that doesn't mean that she doesn't gasp when he embraces her. She can't suppress the strangely pleasant shiver that runs down her spine, or the soft noise of surprise at the complete change of scenery. Her hands creep up to perch tentatively on his arms, needing a link to the familiar. Four boys - that one was most certainly Mr. Lupin, and Sirius was unmistakable. The other two she doesn't know. Where could they be that there were such beautiful four-poster beds, and round walls.... A tower? It reminds her of a castle, or the descriptions she's read of castles, in a sort of cheerfully disorganized, casual luxury that she could only dream of.

She kept her voice low, wonder suffusing her tone as she looked around trying to take in everything at once.]

Where... Where are we?

Hogwarts. My school. This is the room we slept in.

[He points at James, his other arm still firmly around her.]

That's James. James Potter. He was my best friend. Like a brother. Fuck. [He laughs and shakes his head.] More like a brother than my real brother ever was.

[She blinks in surprise and tips her head to look back up at him briefly. He had a brother? ...A question for another time, by the sound of it.]

He's Harry's father, then?

Yeah. Yeah, it is. Looks just like him, right? Except for the eyes... [He trails for a moment, then shakes his head.]

But not for years now. Oh, wait. Time for me to be a brat.

[By that he means his younger self, suddenly jumping up and throwing a balled up piece of paper at James' head, only the other boy catches it before it can hit.]

What's up, Padfoot?

[Apparently something that causes him to smile, wide and mischievous and without the edge of darkness that never quite leaves these days.]

I have an idea.

[It's all very surreal. Every time he speaks, she expects one of the boys to look up and shout, but they don't seem to hear him - or see them. Very odd indeed, a feeling only made worse by the uncanny resemblance Sirius had pointed out. And-- Oh.

That was what he looked like when he was truly happy.

Her breath caught and held as she watched, hardly paying attention to what he's saying. That. That is what she has wanted for him. To see him happy and untouched by the pain and sorrow that later years would bring.]

[As soon as Sirius, the young version, has announced having an idea, all the other boys had shifted their attention to him, even Remus had laid his book aside. Aware of the attention, the young boy slowly walks over to his friends, taking the Marauder's Map out of its hiding place.]

I solemnly swear that I'm up to no good.

[With Sheska in his arms, Sirius had spoken the words at the same time as his younger counterpart, feeling as if he'd been stabbed in the heart.]

I'm just going to talk about recolouring the house colours for Slytherin, it's not that exciting. We can go.

[The words don't mean anything to her, but they clearly do to him. The resonance between the two voices is eerie and she suppresses a very different sort of shiver. Sheska leans back against her friend minutely, offering her support as much as taking his.

This whole experience had spawned more questions than it answered, and she would have liked to keep watching and listening, learning more and, to a far lesser extent, exploring Sirius' world through these boys. But the longer they stayed, the more it seemed to hurt him, and that was the last thing she wanted. So she nodded, and murmured quietly,]

Should I close my eyes again?

No, it's alright. Look.

[The room around them vanishes, the boys fade, and instead they find themselves back above the store again, far from Hogwarts and far from those years.

Sirius lets go of Sheska slowly, swallowing thickly before shaking his head. Damn.]

Do you have any questions, love?

[That was disorienting, and a little stomach-turning, really, but the only sign that she was at all alarmed was a brief tightening of her fingers around his forearm. But then the shop came back into view and with great reluctance she lets him pull away. Immediately she turns toward him, searching his face for... something. What she finds there tangles all her questions into a hard lump in her throat. Mute, she holds out her arms, asking for the hug that he seems to need more than she does, but he'll be too stubbornly stoic to request.]

[~~How is he supposed to get anything done when you won't let him be macho?~~

Sirius stares at her for a moment, but then just hugs her as she seems to be wanting, although he is just a little confused where that came from. He runs hi fingers through her hair and smiles slightly.]

Not a question, that.

[Sheska holds him a little longer and harder than she'd actually meant to, but he wasn't going to acknowledge the hurt and loss she knew he was feeling, and despite how nice it felt when he pets her hair, she's here for him, not herself, and she swallows the lump down to a more reasonable level where they can sort themselves out into individual questions again.

Releasing him, she steps away a little to give him some space and glances back at the silver basin. Who was the fourth boy? Had they been talking about Quidditch? What did that phrase mean? What year had they been in? What subjects had they been taking? What had Mr. Lupin been working on? She looks at him and opens her mouth only to have a completely different question fall out of it.]

How often do you do that?

That? Never, really. I've done it with Remus, when he was there, because he wanted me to... [He breaks off and makes a gesture that could mean anything, pretty much, or maybe nothing.]

I just sometimes wonder what would happen if I did it with my own memories. But, no, I don't regularly use this to escape into the past. I have whiskey for that.

[She casts him a mildly distressed look at the mention of whisky, before realizing it and tamping it down to focus more on the things he'd brought her to see, instead.]

You really enjoyed it there, didn't you? Hogwarts, I mean.

Yeah. It was my home.

[A faint smile as he glances at the Pensieve again and shakes his head slowly.]

It's really not that long ago, I s'pose, but it feels like eternity.

[There it was again. That notion that home was somewhere other than the place where your family resided. Or... maybe it was more that his family wasn't his family. Home wasn't home. So he'd found, or made, a new family. A new home. At Hogwarts? Then, if James Potter was like his brother, then, were the others brothers as well? She smiled to think of Mr. Lupin as a gently chiding older brother figure, but then, he and Sirius had seemed... closer than that. Decidedly more than a brotherly relationship. But that was a sort of family too, if it lasted. So these boys were his family. That place, his home.

She contemplates the pensive thoughtfully.]

And that's where you learned how to use magic. If you had the talent for it. How long did you attend?

Seven years. From around eleven to seventeen. [Sirius falls silent for a moment when he realized that it's really just been about six years.

It seems so much longer, although some of it is still so fresh in his mind. But the boy in that memory, sometimes it seems as if they couldn't be the same person.]

I went to my parents' place every summer. And for winter break, too. Until I ran away with, er, sixteen. Then I lived with James and his parents until I had my own money.

[For a moment, when he falls silent, she wonders if she hit another nerve, but then he continued and she relaxed a little. He'd run away? He must have hated it so much, to cut ties with everything like that. She had never had that sort of experience. The occasional urge to run away from school, perhaps. Or to go another city. But she'd never acted on it. To be able to act like that, to be able to get himself out of that kind of situation, was a kind of courage and bravery she had the utmost respect for.

She would have liked to know more about it, but that would be an extremely touchy subject, and really better one that he should bring up himself. If he ever did.

Speaking of things she wanted to know...]

You all looked so happy... Tell me more about Hogwarts? I don't know much about it, really. We discussed magic with Mr. Lupin, but the school only came up peripherally.

[video]

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