Author: Sorting Hat
Story: Reflections
Rating: Everyone
Setting: Pre-DH
Status: Completed
Reviews: 5
Words: 869
A/N: A quick little fic to try and get my muse to wake up.
16th June 1994
Wormtail sighed as he heard the whistle of the Hogwarts Express echo through the forest. The students would be leaving then, and he could be on his way. They wouldn't bother searching for him in the Forbidden Forest, and he knew the creatures would not dare harm him. The scent of his Dark Mark would see to that. Even so, Wormtail couldn't help but think back to an earlier time. A time when he didn't have quite so much to hide...or to lose. Before he'd become a monster, before his life had taken its turn toward evil.
16th August, 1958
"The war has taken a heavy toll on our side, Sirius!" Remus snapped, clearly surprised that Sirius could laugh about such things.
"I know, Moony. I know. It all seems so far away from Hogwarts though, doesn't it?" Sirius replied.
Wormtail rolled his eyes. Next, Remus would say that the war affected everyone, regardless of how far away it might seem. Even so, he shuddered a bit. What if it wasn't so far away? What if he lost his friends? He couldn't make it alone, could he?
"Damn it, Padfoot, people are dying out there! You know, I wouldn't be a bit surprised if the entire Muggle population between eighteen and thirty-five is GONE by the end of this stupid war!"
Wormtail nodded to himself. Now Sirius would agree with Remus, and try to appear upset. James would whack Sirius in the back of the head and tell him to have some respect for the dead. Sirius would start to berate James, but James would shake his head at both of them and tell them both to keep their eyes on their studies.
"I know Moony. I'm sorry. I'll try to—ouch!"
James had whacked Sirius on the back of the head. "Have some respect, Padfoot. This isn't a game. When people die, it's for real."
"Now look here Prongs--!"
James shook his head. "Look. We have exams to worry about. Why don't you both shut up and get back to work. I don't know about you but I do not want to be scrubbing the hospital wing without magic when I could be playing Quidditch."
"But McGonagall said that if you failed another test--" Wormtail started.
"She just has no appreciation for the finer things in life, Wormtail," Sirius quipped. With a collective sigh, all four boys leaned over their study revisions.
*
Malfoy glared at Peter for several moments, causing Peter to swallow in fear. "You know what's going to happen. The war will end, and everyone who stands against him will die. You don't want to die do you?"
"But it's wrong, Lucius. It's evil," Wormtail said, his voice quivering. Malfoy was right. The good guys were losing the war. The Muggles had no idea that this war was being fought, right under their noses. It was all that insane wizard's fault. What was the man's name? It hovered just beneath Wormtail's grasp in his mind, and eventually he gave up trying to remember.
"There is no evil, you stupid prat! Only power, and those too weak to seek it! We can protect you. You will never have to fear anyone again. Don't you want to be safe? Don't you want to live?"
"But my friends--" Wormtail began, but Malfoy cut him off.
"Your so-called friends don't care! Were you asleep when your so-called friends tried to have Snape killed? Is that the action of people who care?" Lucius' sneer dripped contempt.
Malfoy couldn't possibly know about Remus, could he? He had to be talking about something else. He had to be.
"They're good men. They'll--" Wormtail tried again, and again he was cut off.
"You know too much. I've said too much. We can't have any witnesses. We're going to have to...eliminate you," Malfoy said, drawing his wand. Beside him, several of his other friends in black robes and masks had drawn theirs as well.
"No!" Wormtail squeaked, trying to back away. "I'll do it! Don't hurt me!" He thrust out his wrist, trying to move away form the tips of their wands.
One of the Death Eaters began to laugh then. The taller one, who seemed to be the most pale. He grabbed Wormtail's wrist and pressed his wand against it. Wormtail screamed as his flesh took their mark. The Dark Mark. He screamed as his soul was stained with evil.
16th June 1994
That was the day he lost the first piece of his soul. It wouldn't be long before he'd lost the rest. His thoughts drifted back to his friend's words, in the Shrieking Shack.
"They'd have killed me Remus!"
"Then you should have died, as we would have done for you!"
As Wormtail looked sadly about at his surroundings, he whispered to himself, "Perhaps I should have. Things might have been better for all of us."
He had a long way to go. Wormtail sighed to himself as he transformed, and with only his thoughts to keep him company, began his long journey away from the only place he'd ever truly felt at home.