GOOD DOG || Sirius Black

(Twenty Nine: Sonder)

"I meant," Logan stressed, sighing dramatically, "I basically just came out to you, and your response is 'huh'?"

The girl scrunched her face up, "Isn't that a good response?"

"A little underwhelming." Logan held his thumb and forefinger up, inches apart.

Alex grinned, "Sorry. I'll bring the rainbows and the special gay cake next time."

"What's a gay cake?" Logan seemed intrigued.

"I dunno. I think it's like a normal cake, but with more gay." Alex decided.

"Right. Of course. Stupid of me to ask."

{===}

The room was dark.

Not like a school hall at night is dark, or the inside of a closet is dark, but like a half-arsed haunted house is dark. Drapes hung from all the windows, casting the already-shadowed corners of the room into futher blackness. There were moth eaten sofas, grey with age, lying about like a bored toddler had tossed them to the floor with semi-formed resolutions to tidy up later. The floorboards were broken in half in places, nails sticking upwards like clawed fingers reaching for the ankle of the unsuspecting child.

The two school boys were stood in the centre of the space. Not because they were brave, or because they felt comfortable in the unusually drab chamber, but because it was the sole area visible that was lit up by the moonlight drifting wearily through the slight gaps in the curtains. 

Both of them wore the greasy black hair of kids who had hit their emo stage years before and were waiting for a chance to grow out of it, just as they both donned black robes with green and silver trimming marching along the edges. In fact, the only difference you would notice from this rather obscured view of them would be the fact that one was significantly shorter than the other, and that his shoes shone in the low light, while the taller's remained dull and unpolished.

They both shuffled on their feet.

As they waited in tense silence, a voice became audible from just outside the battered wooden door, "...No no, they exploded the Mitchell residence with their own fireworks. I'd like to see what the insurance company makes of that."

The door swung open and a young man in his twenties pushed through the opening. He was wearing a muggle business suit with the sleeves rolled up to reveal the Dark Mark tattooed on his inner forearm. His dark hair was slicked back with careless precision, staying clear out of his blue eyes. He was speaking into an expensive looking I-something phone.

He gave the boys a quick once-over and continued speaking, "I have to go... No, it's fine. Tell your grandmother I'll pop round tomorrow with some flowers."

He hung up the phone, and glanced at it for a moment before dropping it on the ground and stomping down on it with the heel of his perfectly polished shoe. The nervously watching boys both flinched at the crack the screen gave as it broke. Without another glance towards the broken gadget, the man stepped over the shards and smiled at the boys, as if nothing had happened.

"Sorry for the wait, chaps." He had a pleasant kind of voice, friendly and jovial while still maintaining a formal air of business, "My eight o'clock overran a little, you know how it is. Thought he'd only make it to Cardiff, turns out he was halfway up the Welsh coastline. Oops. Still, job got done in the end, that's what's important, isn't it?"

The boys glanced at one another.

The man looked around, "My apologies on the choice of meeting place. Some people find the irony of a haunted house a bit much, but I think we should embrace our more colourful side. Not that our uniform is what you would call an overflow of expressive tone."

The taller goth glanced at the smaller before stepping forwards, "Not to be rude, but why did the Dark Lord summon us here?"

"Oh, don't inflate your own importance, Snape." The man gestured dismissively towards him, the majority of his attention focused on frowning at a patch of sofa that was slightly less mouldy than the others, patting down the material and sitting with one leg crossed over the other, "The Dark Lord didn't call you or the Black boy here. I did."

Regulas Black glanced at his feet before responding, "But why?"

The man didn't answer straight away. He was too preoccupied poking curiously at a half-formed Frankenstein mask at his feet with a cane that lay on the floor, "The Dark Lord has seen fit to place me in charge of a certain division, the nature of which is more... ambiguous than the standard member of our ranks is equipped to deal with."

"And what is that?" Snape asked, clearly trying to maintain a mask that hid his nerves, which quite defeated the object.

"Prophecies." The man sat back, laying his arms leisurely over the back of the sofa. He was facing away from the two boys now, which allowed them to exchange looks, and towards an ancient fireplace that was almost black with soot.

Regulas spluttered, "Prophecies?" He echoed.

"Yes, Black." The man drawled, "Prophecies, fortunes, predictions, divination, clairvoyance, second sight. All the vague bullshit-ery that encompasses the world the common labourer likes to think of as the future, and the more open-minded associates with the unturned page."

Regulas was almost shaking with anticipation, "Are we in a prophecy?"

"That you are not." The man informed him, checking his fingernails for chips, "But I heard a nasty rumour that one," He glanced at the rough notes scrawled on his palm, "Alexandria Fawley and one," He pointed at Regulas without looking at him, "Sirius Black are."

"Alex?" The incredulous word slipped out before Severus meant it to. He immediately bit his lip and looked down again, entire posture bent by the sharp gaze the man fixed him with.

The man raised his eyebrows, "Indeed. You've clearly already become acquainted. That's good. Perhaps you entered yourself into a young witch's life under the pretence that the blood running through her veins was indicative of a brother-in-arms type scenario, but that is not the case."

"She's a blood traitor." Regulas confirmed, "One who's been spending a lot of time with my... brother." He had to force out the word.

"Correctomundo!" The man pointed at him before returning his attention to Severus, "Something you must have noticed as well, Snape, what with your current position as her tutor?"

"Of course." Severus responded stiffly.

"And," The man stood again, turning to face them and tucking his hands behind his back like a Victorian butler, "It is exactly this connection between the Fawley girl and the other Black son that intrigues me."

"And why is that, might I ask?" Severus asked delicately.

The man abandoned his pretence of civility, crossing his arms and leaning against the back of the sofa, "The details of the prophecy are not your concern. Observation, inquiry and action are. All you need to know is that there is a page that we, as a collective, are very keen to see turned, and we need these two players in certain places for that to become a reality."

"I don't understand." Regulas said, perhaps naïvely, "You want us to keep them apart?"

"Oh no." The man smiled now, and Severus was reminded of a knife cut, of how it took a second for the blood to start seeping through, "That's not what we want at all. I hope you packed your bags, boys, because we're in this for the long haul."

And Severus almost asked 'what's your name?' but he caught himself just in time. This wasn't the kind of place where details like that were openly shared. For a brief second, just a flash really, he regretted joining the Death Eaters. He regretted the fact that he might have to hurt Lily one day, regretted that now the one other girl he'd begun to think of as a friend had been placed into that same disposable category, regretted the flash of obstinate, irrational anger that came with seeing Lily laughing at one of Potter's poor jokes that prompted him to join the Fun Club of Doom and Racism.

But his mind soon returned to his body and he met the shadow man's eyes with an even gaze, "What do you need us to do?"