Chapter 1: The Last Train Home (Part 3)

Almost exactly an hour and a half later, Remus made his way down the stairs into the nearly empty Common Room to join James and Lily near the window where he promptly demanded to be dealt into their ferociously competitive muggle card game which Lily had gotten them all hooked on. Marlene and Dorcas were the next to join and by the time Peter and Sirius stumbled blearily out of the dorm, it would be hard to audibly guess how empty the Common Room really was based on the loud cries of joy and despair that emanated from their crowded card table.

The rest of the day was spent roaming the grounds lazily, visiting all of their favorite haunts, seeing (and tormenting) their favorite professors, and slowly growing more anxious for their night of impending graduation. All of this was done with an air of nostalgia with random memories from years before being wrought from the depths of their subconscious. Their conversations were full of reminiscing, full of hopes for the distant future, and full of fears or doubts for the near future that was coming quicker than any could have expected. The ceremony itself was short, sweet, nostalgic, and like any good graduation ceremony, ended in the graduates finding themselves surrounded by a small mountain of food. In this case, after the ceremonial boat ride across the Great Lake, they claimed their infamous compartment on the Hogwarts Express and bought so many snacks from the trolley that one might think they could never get licorice wands or cockroach clusters from anywhere except from the train itself.

"I can't believe this is our last time on this train," Peter said morosely, picking at an empty wrapper nearby.

"I can!" Sirius said, his optimism sharply contrasting Peter's gloom. "I never have to sit through a boring lecture again!"

"Did you actually listen to any of those boring lectures, Black?" Marlene accused, her arms crossed playfully.

"Occasionally. Though why bother when copying Remus's notes was far more efficient."

James and Sirius chuckled while Remus simply rolled his eyes, too accustomed to his blatant cheating to even attempt to put a stop to it anymore. "I deserve at least half of your OWLs and NEWTs. You would have failed if not for me."

"I would not have failed! I wouldn't have done quite so magnificently, but I would have passed," Sirius insisted, though it was hard to ignore the rest of the compartment's stifled giggles.

Remus decided to play along and offered, "Fine, a quarter then, if you want to live in your delusions a little longer."

"Deal," Sirius grinned.

"Like you'll need them," Lily added in. "I'm sure you did great."

"Awww. How touching," Sirius said cloyingly. He stretched out his long legs from where he was sitting on the floor and kicked Lily's foot teasingly.

"I'm sure we all did great," Lily amended with a smile.

"Besides, it's not like any of us will need them," Peter added monotonously. When all eyes turned to him, his cheeks flushed and his shoulders hunched, pushing him further into the corner.

"What do you mean?" James inquired politely from the other end of the bench.

"Well… we all have jobs of sorts, don't we? The Order doesn't exactly care which OWLs we got. We're already in," he said, his voice the audible embodiment of a shrug.

The three girls exchanged a glance. "Yeah, but what about after the Order? This war will end sometime and then we'll have to move on. It wouldn't hurt to have good grades to fall back on if we needed," Dorcas suggested.

Peter nodded slowly. "Yeah…"

"Cheer up, mate!" Sirius said, kicking his shin much harder than he did Lily's.

"Ow!" Peter moaned quietly, rubbing his leg while Sirius continued without pause.

"We're off to do some good in the world! To make a difference!"

"We're off to make good ole' Godric proud," James added in a near identical voice, full of bravado.

"But… what if… what…"

"What is it, Peter?" Lily asked kindly.

He sighed. "What difference can we really make though? We're just a bunch of teenagers!"

James blinked as if he had never considered this before. "Teenagers that were chosen by Dumbledore himself!"

"I wasn't," Peter replied bitterly. "You were invited, sure, but I was just there and he said you could drag me along."

"He wouldn't have said that if he didn't believe you were capable, Wormtail," Remus said.

Peter leaned forward now. "Even still. That's only seven more of us against how many Death Eaters?"

James frowned. "Not sure. I'm guessing we'll find out at our first official Order meeting."

"And what can we really do to stop them? We'll have to defeat you-know-who if this is ever going to end. How can we possibly do that!?"

Sirius leaned forward off of the seat behind him. "Well Dumbledore–"

"We are way out of our league here! Wouldn't it be smarter to just sit back and… and… and play it safe?" Peter continued, his hands flying frantically.

"But what would happen if everyone said that?" Lily asked quietly after she was sure that Peter was finished. "If everyone wanted to let other people take care of it, then Voldemort could just waltz right in and I, and everyone like me, would be a goner."

Peter met her gaze and the panicking light in his eyes diminished. In a meek voice, he said, "But why does it have to be us?"

"Why not us?" Sirius insisted. "Sure we're young, naive, inexperienced–"

"Not helping, Pads," Remus murmured.

"-but everyone has to start somewhere! Besides, Moody is going to train us up in no time! That'll boost your confidence!"

"Though I'm sure you don't have to be in the thick of it if you aren't willing, Peter," Remus said. "There are plenty of really important behind-the-scenes kinds of jobs too."

"No, no, no!" Peter insisted. "I want to do whatever you're all doing. I'm just… it's…"

"Scary?" James asked.

"Terrifying?" Lily suggested.

"Mind-numbingly harrowing?" Remus added.

With a histrionic sigh, Peter nodded. "Exactly."

"Well, we're all scared, Peter," Marlene admitted with a small smile.

"Yeah?" he asked, doubtfully, his gaze naturally straying towards James.

"Of course!" James insisted obediently. "But as my Dad always says, Gryffindors aren't fearless. They just know how to meet their fears head on."

Peter pursed his lips in some semblance of a smile and nodded.

"I know what you need, Wormtail!" Sirius declared, jumping to his feet. "To be bested once more in a round of pock-er."

"Poker," Lily corrected with a giggle as Sirius opened Lily's bag unceremoniously, digging around for her deck of cards.

"Like you're going to win when you can't even pronounce it right," Dorcas snapped, instantly edging forward, her competitive streak taking hold, her eyes gleaming as she watched Lily expertly shuffle the deck.

With a smile at his friends' antics, James politely excused himself to use the restroom and do a quick patrol as he walked the corridors–his last set of Head Boy duties. But when he was making his way back, his brow furrowed slightly at what he saw, though he refused to let his steps falter. Instead, he continued his relaxed gait until he was beside the small cluster of older students.

"Good afternoon," James said pleasantly.

Mulciber, Avery, and Vanity scowled simultaneously as their attention was drawn towards him.

"Please find a compartment soon. I'm afraid you shouldn't be blocking the corridor if you can help it," James continued with an even smile, though his eyes roved over their expressions, hungrily searching for a clue of any misdeed.

"Certainly, Head Boy," Mulciber replied after a beat of silence, emphasizing the title sarcastically.

Avery stepped closer to James until they were mere inches apart.

"I confess, I didn't think we were this friendly, Avery," James joked, refusing to draw himself backwards.

Avery's eyes merely narrowed. He tilted his chin up to appear taller and he squinted down at James who was still smiling pleasantly back, though his every bone was tense with anticipation. "Enjoy the ride home, Potter. I'm sure I'll be seeing you again quite soon."

Finally, Avery stepped back and under the guise of a friendly pat on the shoulder, gripped James so tightly that he could feel Avery's fingernails through his t-shirt. "And I do hope you enjoy the company of that mudblood girlfriend of yours."

James frowned and his heart skipped a beat, but he forced his hands to remain in his pockets even as they curled into fists.

Avery laughed, seeming to sense his internal struggle. "Ah, she has you well-trained. We'll see how long this… shall we say… diplomacy lasts, won't we?" With that, he turned on his heel and cut through the small gap between his friends.

Vanity gave her best facsimile of a smile before sauntering after Avery, and Mulciber gave a sweeping, mocking bow, saying, "I do hope to run into you and your friends, Potter. We can only hope it is sooner than expected."

James watched them depart towards the front of the train, their laughter echoing down the corridor. What did all of that mean? Were they simply taunting him as usual, or was something more out-of-the-ordinary going on? It certainly seemed like they were hinting at something specific, yet nothing in particular that they said gave it away. Sure, they were undeniably threatening him, but that was old news. That was merely the same banter that they had been exchanging for the entire year as their places in this war were further established. Was that truly all it was?

"Excuse me," a short first year muttered, snapping him out of his reverie.

"Sorry," James mumbled and stood aside to let her pass beside him in the narrow corridor. With one backwards glance at the long gone Slytherins, James found his way back to his own compartment, his thoughts far away from poker or whatever game they had turned to by now.

Nonetheless, he slid the door open exactly when Remus had won the round, the mingled cries of victory and despair spilling out. Grinning like the rest of them, Lily looked up as he made his way towards her. She automatically moved aside, making room next to her for James and instantly, her hand fell to his arm.

"What's wrong?" she asked quietly.

"I'm sure it's fine," he muttered, refusing to meet her worried gaze and instead, searched for spare candy or chocolate he could use as poker chips to join the next round.

Lily watched his futile search a minute longer, knowing that James could feel her eyes on him. "Can you tell me anyways?"

James paused and felt her hand cover his own on the seat between them.

"I'll give you half of my stash of chocolate coin poker chips," she added.

The corners of James' lips quirked up and he used his knuckles to shove his glasses further up his nose. After sighing slightly, he acquiesced and turned towards her. "I just ran into Avery, Mulciber, and that sixth year girl, something Vanity–"

"Emma?"

"Yeah, her." And for someone originally so reluctant to share his anxieties at all, he found himself searching to remember the exact words and phrases to give Lily as close to an exact reenactment as possible. Nonetheless, he finished his spiel with, "But I'm sure it's nothing… right?"

Lily frowned. "Nothing that we can change, at least."

James nodded and squeezed her hand, finding solace in their interlaced fingers. She gave a smile as he leaned forward to kiss her temple before they turned back to the card game at hand.