Animangusified
Next day, they still hadn't found Peter. The most maddening part was that his dot was now showing up, but it looked as though he was still in the common room somewhere - except he wasn't there - anywhere. Sirius had checked profusely and even gone so far as to ask one of the first year girls if they'd seen Peter up in the girls' dorms. "He's got to be somewhere," Remus insisted as they made their way to the Great Hall for breakfast. "He's probably just playing a trick of some sort."
"I'm telling you, Veigler's stolen him. He's holding him hostage," Sirius persisted. "Veigler came out of those woods with Hagrid last night looking so bloody shady -- you wouldn't doubt it if you'd seen it!" He hadn't stopped saying this, each time as though it were a new point to be made. "He's keeping Peter for ransom!"
"Well he's doing a shoddy job of it," Remus said, "You have to tell someone you've got the thing they want in order for ransom to be collected. Everybody knows that."
Sirius scowled, "I don't trust him."
"We've been over this. About a hundred times. It's not helping find Peter," Remus said.
James pushed Remus's chair into the Great Hall. "Well the Map says he's in the common room."
"But he's not there," Sirius said, exasperated. "We looked everywhere. I even looked under the bloody furniture, as though Peter's fat arse could squeeze under the dresser!"
James was quiet, a concerned look on his face as he pushed Remus up to the chair and came around the table to sit himself down next to Sirius. "Not to - to be the one who goes - you know - to dark places, but... Do ghosts show up on the map? Anyone noticed yet?"
"I saw Peeves on it," Sirius said quickly before realizing what James was inferring. He looked at James with a disturbed look on his face, "You don't think --"
"I hope not, but --" James looked sick.
Remus sighed, "Peter's not --" he paused, then stared over again, "If Veigler took Peter out of the dorm, we would've heard him."
"I heard something," Sirius insisted, "Something that woke me up."
"The spilled books," Remus said.
"Maybe - or maybe Veigler knocked the books over in getting Pete out of the room!" Sirius said.
"I still think he's playing a trick of some sort," Remus insisted. "You you sure he couldn't have got the invisibility cloak and --"
"We had the invisibility cloak, first off," said Sirius.
James spoke up, "And second, if Peter was playing a trick, he'd have come down to breakfast. He can't ever resist food. Even for a good prank."
Sirius lifted his fork to spear a couple pancakes from across the table, "And - besides all that --"
"Excuse me." Frank leaned in between James and Sirius, "Have either of you heard of anyone missing their rat?"
"Their rat?" Sirius made a face. "No, why."
Frank sighed and put down a plastic box on the table. Inside was a fat grey rat, asleep in a balled up pair of dirty socks with an empty Honeydukes wrapper clutched in his tiny paws. "Andy found this last night in the dormitory. He's far too fat to be a wild rat. Don't you think?"
"Looks like he's made his home in the kitchens," Sirius said, "Blimey, never saw a rat so fat!"
Frank nodded, "He is very large. Like he had an engorgio placed on him. Dunno. Anyway, if you hear 'bout anyone who's missing one -- let me know." He ducked away, taking the rat with him.
Sirius sighed, "We just need to find Peter is all."
Remus was staring after Frank Longbottom. He looked at Sirius, "How did Snuffles come about again?"
Sirius gave Remus a look as though he had multiple heads coming out of his shoulders. "I dunno, I was asleep and --"
"And it just happened, yeah?" he prodded, "While you were sleeping?"
"Yeah - I woke up in the morning and -- and -- and --" The light dawned in his eyes and Sirius spun about. "OI -- FRANK!!!" he up to run after Longbottom, "Wait up with that rat!"
The three of them sat around the dormitory, James and Sirius each on the ends of their beds, Remus in his wheelchair, holding the struggling rat in his fist. "Ready, Sirius?" said Lupin.
Sirius had his wand as he sat on the bed. He stared at the struggling rat. "Together?" he asked quietly.
"I think so," said Remus, holding the rat tightly in one hand, his wand in the other. "On the count of three. One - two - THREE!"
"Homorphus!"
A flash of blue-white light erupted from both wands; for a moment the rat was frozen in mid-air, his small grey-black form twisting mady - and then the rat fell and hit the floor. There was another blinding flash of light and then --
There he was, a boy again.
"Well hello, Peter," said Remus, grinning at their friend, "Long time, no see."
Peter got up from the floor, a bit shaky in the knees, looking around at them. "S - s - Sirius. Remus. James!" he said, "Oh thank goodness. That was awful!" Peter tripped and James jumped up to catch him from falling, as did Sirius.
"But you've done it!" Sirius said.
"Yeah!" James said, "You animagusified!"
"That's not even close to a word," said Remus, looking at James.
Peter said, "I have no idea how I have done, though. It just - I woke up and I was a rat and - you lot have no idea how bloody horrifying that was. I fell off the books and you almost stepped on me! Then I was falling down whole floors in the air vents and then there was Andy Woodhouse with the book -- and that horrible box --!"
Sirius laughed, "Sounds as though you had quite an adventure!"
"Far too much for my taste."
Remus said, "See? Veigler didn't kidnap him after all."
Peter looked confused, "Is that what you lot thought? That Veigler had kidnapped me?"
"Well, you'd both gone missing off the map at the same time," James explained sheepishly. "We figured he'd seen us and hauled you off into the Forest to get information about what we all knew about what the centaurs said."
Sirius added, "Then we ran into him out on the grounds and we thought for sure you were a goner! Especially when we noticed your name had come back up on the Map after... James was scared it was your ghost even!"
"Wait, you went out on the grounds?" Peter's eyes widened, "Whyever for?!"
"To rescue you from Veigler, of course!" James said.
"Well, I slept through it," Remus said, his tone clear he was holding a bit of a grudge on the other boys for it. "I would've helped if they'd woken me up."
James pointed to Remus's leg, "We couldn't go hauling you all over the grounds of Hogwarts with that leg of yours, of course," he said, "We had to be fast if we were going to save Peter!"
Peter's eyes were wet and wide. "You - you came to save me?"
"Of course we did, mate," Sirius said.
Peter ran at them, knocking Sirius and James both into Remus's chair and squeezing all three of them at once. "Bloody hell, being a rat makes you mighty weepy," said Sirius, who wasn't entirely sure he was enjoying all of the close personal contact he was getting as he was forced to press against the others in this bear hug. Peter didn't relent for several beats and then Sirius could take it no longer and he eked his way out. "Alright, enough with the mushy stuff..."
That night, late, long after Remus and Peter had fallen asleep - which had taken forever, as Peter was quite nervous he might turn into a rat again the moment he closed his eyes again - Sirius and James sat up, sitting facing one another and playing Wizard Chess on the nightstand between their beds. Sirius leaned over to look at Peter in his bed. "So... a rat."
"A rat," James nodded.
"I thought we were kidding him about being a squirrel or something," Sirius said. He concentrated on his next move, his chin resting on his fist. "Do you reckon -" he moved his knight, "- Peter's got much in common with a rat?"
James chewed on the inside of his cheek thoughtfully. "I heard Remus tell Peter something yesterday. About rodents."
"What about 'em?" Sirius asked. He watched James move a piece, then quickly checked him with a series of quick moves. He looked up at James with a questioning look as James sighed and sat back from the chess set, not watching as Sirius's pieces destroyed the last of James's and celebrated their success.
James said, "Well, he was telling Peter how smart rodents are, really, and how they're underestimated mostly."
Sirius thought about it a long moment, then nodded, "Yeah, that sounds like Peter."
"Yeah it does," James agreed. He swept his groaning chess pieces into their bag and tossed it into his trunk at the foot of the bed. He threw himself back on his bed and crossed his legs, staring up at the ceiling.
Sirius thought about it a moment. "You'll get it soon, too."
"Yeah, I know," James said with more confidence than he really felt. "I'm sure it'll be easy once I get the hang on it."
"Yeah," Sirius agreed. "It'll be grand."
"Yeah," James agreed.
Sirius got up suddenly and climbed onto James's bed, squashing in next to his friend so they were barely able to fit side-by-side. Their heads bumped against one another and Sirius laughed and reached up to rub James's forehead as James rubbed Sirius's and laughed, too. "Hey, you're brilliant, alright? Taking a minute to do the animagi thing doesn't mean you're not."
"Oh I know," James nodded.
Sirius smirked, "I know you know, but I also know that sometimes you need to hear it, too."
James would never have admitted it - but he really did.