Chapter 1
Trudging through a wooded area not far from his home, absentminded, James was vaguely aware that he was bleeding, a gash on his bicep where his mother slashed him with a kitchen knife. Actually, no—that wasn’t his mother. That was not his mother. Because Euphemia Potter was a lot of things but… whatever that was in his house, that was not one of them.
There’d been reports on the news in the past few days of an outbreak of some novel, deadly disease, popping up first in Germany and then spreading quickly across the planet. The amount of information released wasn't much, seeing as there was nothing to go off of besides seventy-two hours of observation—no research, no concrete data, no cure, no vaccine. Scientists around the world had holed themselves up in their labs, promising news channels they’d find a cure.
But now James was positive that a cure was impossible, because nothing could bring his parents back. They were gone, violently and suddenly, dead in all ways but physical. Their eyes held no light, no warmth, their faces no smiles, and he knew for certain that if even the smallest possible bit of them remained, they would have destroyed themselves before ever laying a finger on James—or a knife.
He glanced at the cut on his arm, his movements stiff and jerky. The bleeding was slower now.
A small part of him, a nagging in the far corners of his mind, wished his parents had succeeded in killing him, so that he wouldn’t have to live in a world without them. He could have let them—he almost did; tears fogging his glasses, yelling “Mum, Dad, it’s me! It’s James!” He was backed into a corner, his dad’s expression so incomprehensibly blank, his mother’s fingers dancing clumsily with the knife. He wasn’t even sure she knew what it was, or how to use it.
The whites of their eyes had turned black, their irises bright yellow, glowing in the dim lighting. Their skin was mottled and desaturated, their hair stringy. They smelled like death, intensely, the entire room filling with the potent, eye-watering stench. His dad didn’t have his glasses, and his mum was without her earrings. And yet they looked so startlingly like his parents that his impulses were telling him to hide in their arms, because that was where he was safe. He was afraid—afraid of them—but he found solace in them just the same.
It wasn’t until she striked—until the sharp flood of pain—that his survival instincts kicked in and he began to run.
He still hadn’t looked back. He didn’t trust himself to look back without changing directions and returning, begging his parents to wake up as they tried to kill him again. He didn’t trust himself to get away from them a second time.
His mind was turning over thoughts so quickly he couldn’t keep up, couldn’t understand, and that made for what felt like an empty head. It’s as if it was so loud it was quiet, like he was deafened by the noise. But then one thought broke through the fog, and he was so abruptly brought back to reality that he staggered, catching himself on a tree in order to stay upright.
(Sirius.)
Sirius had left just hours before the first reported case went public, setting out in hopes of finally buying his dream motorbike. “This is it, Jamesie, I can feel it in my bones!” he had said, beaming, his hands on James’ shoulders as he shook him in excitement. “They’re idiots to sell such a work of art, but hey, I’m not complaining. I’ll see you later, yeah? Bye Effie! Bye Monty!”
That was three days ago.
James never saw him again.
The problem wasn’t that he thought Sirius was dead—he didn’t. He knew he was alive. He didn’t know how he knew, but he did, because surely he would sense it if Sirius died. He would feel it, like a stab in the heart, invisible hands squeezing the air out of his lungs, vision going black. Sirius was his other half; his best friend, his platonic soulmate, his brother in every sense of the word, and he refused to believe that life would continue as normal without him. It was impossible.
The problem was that James had no way of finding him, of telling him to stay away from home, of telling him what happened to their parents. He hadn’t been answering his phone, and he hadn’t told them where he was going. James needed him to stay away, needed him to know to stay away… yet, he also just… needed him.
It would’ve been so much better if Sirius had been there from the start, had been there throughout the rapid deterioration of his parents, had escaped with him, walking by his side through the trees.
Euphemia and Fleamont Potter were gone. They were dead, and the world was duller for it. But Sirius wasn’t gone, yet he wasn’t here, either. James wanted him here, present, with him. It hurt, hurt, hurt so much, and he wasn’t made to handle things like this alone. He wasn’t made to be alone, period.
But Sirius was absent. He wasn’t there from the beginning, no matter how many times James wished that he was. And because of that, he needed to stay absent, because awaiting him was nothing but two ravenous corpses.
He needed to find him.
—
Roughly an hour had passed, and James realised that if he focused solely on finding Sirius, he thought less about everything else. His head was clearer, and his wound was completely scabbed over. All in all, he was doing better.
He figured the best place to start would be the closest town to their house, where his mother did the shopping and his father went to work, where plenty of people could potentially have a motorbike for sale. He was nearing it now and he could see, already, the chaos unleashed alongside the sickness.
He thought he was prepared, that he’d seen the worst of it, what with the experience of two monsters centimetres from him at once, gnashing teeth moments from killing him. He quickly realised that in his lonely, large house, he’d been hidden from even worse.
There were no moving vehicles, and the only cars on the roads were empty, some of which had been crashed into each other. Windows were boarded up, and blood was smeared on the sidewalks. Discarded things littered the ground; a single baby shoe in the middle of the street, a torn tie a few feet away from it. He could faintly register the sound of crying drifting through the breeze, the sounds of despair from the townspeople hiding themselves away. Truely, it looked like a ghost town from a scene in a movie. It was lifeless—save for more of those things shuffling down the street. But James would rather not think of them as “alive.”
It was easier to think of them as dead, as other, as creatures—parasitic creatures killing hosts and using their bodies. Because that way his mother didn’t cut him, that way his parents died loving him, loving life, memories and morals intact. They lived, got old, got sick, and died.
All the moving bodies limping around—the men, women, children—they weren’t people. They looked like people—or close to it at least—but they weren’t.
A tall, slender man-thing who looked to be around James’ age tilted its head at him, blinking slowly. It seemed more… decomposed… like it’d been dead longer than his parents had. The stained clothes hanging off its body were torn, revealing an ugly, bloody bite mark just above its left hip. The wound was puffy and purple, dark lines spider-webbing away from it along its skin.
It made a gurgling noise, like it was trying to speak, and then clacked its jaw together and began to speed up towards him. James cursed under his breath as more of them shifted their attention to him.
He should have seen this coming, but with so many other things going on he hadn’t really thought about it. These things were predators. The first thing the shells of his parents did when they died was get up and attack him—why would the ones here be any different?
James ran. They chased.
There were only around ten of them, but he was just one person. Plus, he didn’t know how to fight—not that he’d ever admit that out loud. He’s had playful wrestling matches with Sirius, and his mother taught him how to throw a punch, but he wouldn’t bet on his chances.
The sound of his own frantic footsteps was loud in his ears. Rushing past, he could see the remnants of others that had been in the same predicament as him—more abandoned shoes, an empty baby carriage, half-eaten food. He figured they must have been as scared as he was; heart thumping wildly, blood cold, running through his veins thick like syrup, hyper-aware of his own mortality. He wondered if any of them became the monsters chasing him now.
The things were quick, but not quick enough—fast, but not nearly as fast as a human; their rotting feet made sure of that. Pushing things aside as they passed them, eyes frenzied with hunger, they stumbled over nothing, as if they were still learning how to use their limbs.
James lost them, eventually, but he didn’t stop.
He wondered if the people boarded safely in their homes, their shops, their shelters, could hear him running. They must, right? Because his heartbeat, his breathing, his footsteps, so loud, so erratic, surely someone must hear.
But then… Why was he alone? Where was everyone?
He knew, logically, that they must be scared, too. Who knows how long these things have roamed the town? They’ve probably been dealing with those things longer than he has, trapping them in their homes, wondering when they’d run out of food, water, or electricity. That, or they really didn’t hear him, their lives continuing as normal (or as normal as it could get, now) as his felt like it was ending.
He couldn't wrap his head around the fact that someone's whole world could be crashing down around them in such close proximity to so many unknowing people. Maybe that was him being self-obsessed, but he'd like to think if he was in their shoes he’d notice. He’d like to think he’d do something to help.
He wondered if he's already been on the other side of it, oblivious.
The mob was long behind him now, but he kept running, the only moving thing in the street, zipping past the closed down shops like his life still depended on it. He took a moment to look over his shoulder, checking for the seventh or eighth time that they were really gone, but then he knocked right into something and fell, the palms of his hands scraping the pavement and his glasses clattering away.
A large, muscular, woman-monster lay beside him, having fallen as well. She must have come from the alley they were next to, lumbering into view just as he looked away.
James made a choking noise and flipped himself over, crawling backwards away from it. He made an attempt to push himself to his feet, but the thing growled and launched itself at him. He fell flat on his back, a gasp escaping him as his lungs violently emptied. It had a knee pressing into his stomach, its feet caging his legs, its arms grasping firmly on his shoulders.
Tears welled up in his eyes as he tried to catch his breath, tried to push it off. He was flailing. The thing seemed amused, its chapped lips bordering on a smile, revealing its dirty, blood-stained teeth.
He clenched his eyes shut, still scrambling to get away. He’d almost accepted it before—death—when it was his parents leading him there. He hadn’t felt endangered, not really, as if they were taking him somewhere with them. But he could feel it now; the terror; his heart in his throat, the mounting dread in the pit of his stomach, the claws of uncertainty digging into him.
James didn’t want to die.
It grabbed his wrist and he yanked it back. He reached up to grab its thigh, to push it off him, and at the same moment the thing snarled, rolling its jaw and leaning in.
There was a wet thunk.
Glinting in the sun, a piece of metal stuck out of the top of its head, thick brownish blood streaming sluggishly from the wound.
A machete.
Its glowing yellow eyes dimmed. James pushed it off of him and shuffled back, distancing himself from the body.
“It didn’t get you, did it?”
James looked up. Three guys stood there, but it was the one in the front that spoke, his voice low and severe, accent slightly French. He was thin, eyes grey and hair black, curly, long enough to reach his sharp jaw. He looked vaguely familiar. One of the ones behind him—taller, broader, with brown hair—looked pointedly at the third—blonde, with the softest face of the set. James labelled them in his head as The Pretty One, The Tall One, and Blondie respectively.
“Answer the question,” the tallest said. He had a crossbow slung over his back.
“No,” James finally responded, picking up his glasses and making his way to stand. He was still trying to catch his breath. “No, it didn’t, erm, bite me, if that’s what you’re asking.”
“Did it scratch you?” The Pretty One asked, moving toward the corpse to retrieve the machete—his machete, apparently—from its skull. “Scratches have the same effect.”
“Oh. I don’t… I don’t think so.” James ran his gaze down his arms, paranoia tickling up his spine. He checked for tears in his pants, lifted his shirt, but he seemed fine. He felt fine. He tried to convince himself he was fine.
“What’s that on your arm, then?” The Tall One asked. The Pretty One looked up from where he was wiping the dark, gummy blood from his blade on the monster’s clothes.
James, in all of this, had completely forgotten about the cut on his upper arm. Just hours ago, his universe was collapsing, completely destroyed, all summarised simply by the wound near his shoulder and now… he had forgotten. Because somehow it had managed to get worse. That scared him. By nature, he was an optimist—like his parents, but especially his father—and he so desperately wanted to believe that it would get better. The universe would right itself. He would find Sirius and he would be okay. But now he had the lingering question “what if?” tormenting him at every turn, every moment. He couldn’t imagine that it could get worse, that it was even possible at this point, but he thought that then, too, when his back was pressed against the wall and his parents tried to kill him. If it got worse then, then who’s to say it won’t again?
“No that’s… that’s from a knife, actually.”
The Tall One whistled, and then declared “dangerous” rather suggestively. He looked at Blondie again, purposefully, mouth pinching slightly at his lack of response. Blondie was blank, quiet, arms crossed tightly over his chest, looking at the dead woman on the ground.
“Ignore him, he’s an idiot,” The Pretty One said—tone serious as always but not malicious. He turned away from the body, placing the machete in the holster hanging from his hip. He stood in front of James, studied his face for a moment, and then held out his hand. “Regulus Black.”
James managed to suppress the surprised laugh that tried to force its way up his throat.
It was if absurdities were piling onto each other—dead people rising to spread the gospel of cannibalism? Sure! Your own parents going crazy and attempting to kill you? Fun! Getting your life saved by Regulus fucking Black? Why not!?
Of all the people in the world. He really wanted to laugh. What’s next, wizards?
He knew who Regulus was—he’d known of Regulus since he was eleven years old. Eleven, when he met Sirius, the new kid. He’d been enrolled as a lesson, sent away to a boarding school far away from his family. Sirius didn’t speak much of his parents, but he did talk a lot about Regulus, the little brother he phoned every night, even though there was never a response. Until he came back after the following summer, his second year at James’ school, and never spoke of anyone in his family again, never again called home.
James thought about all the nights he spent with Sirius, calming him from nightmares, but never getting the full story. Never quite understanding, until the summer after Sirius’ fifth year, when he showed up at the Potter home, weak, battered, tears staining his cheeks.
Yeah, he knew who Regulus was.
James blinked, trying to slow his thoughts, letting his mind catch up to itself.
Part of him wanted to walk away, continue on his own, maybe find a different group of people to help him get to Sirius.
(But he saved my life.)
He wanted to shake him, yell at him all the negative effects him and his family had on Sirius, demand his address and murder his parents.
(If I walk away I’ll just be alone again.)
It’s not as if Regulus would like him anyway; in fact, he’s quite sure Regulus hates him.
(I don’t want to be alone.)
(Am I a bad friend?)
He knew, logically, that whatever went on in the Black home was not Regulus’ fault, but he couldn't help but group him with his parents, his cousins. Sirius hates him, so James hates him. Simple.
(Not simple.)
He knew Sirius missed his brother, even if he never said it. He knew from the way he always searched for the Regulus star in the sky, from the tight-lipped smile he put on when their schoolmates talked about their siblings, from the picture of them together as children he had hidden away in his desk drawer.
This could be good, James thinks. An opportunity to give back to Sirius what he'd lost, to heal old wounds.
(Am I trying to rationalise this?)
He needed allies, desperately. And certainly not enemies.
(Sirius is going to be so mad.)
James looked at Regulus’ outstretched hand. His ringed fingers were long, delicate. There was dirt and blood caked under his fingernails. James flashed a lopsided grin, flicked the hair out of his face, and shook it, grip firm. “James,” he said.
“Just James?” Regulus asked, a smirk tugging on his lips.
“Just James.” Regulus ducked his head in acknowledgment, then turned to the other two. They were having a rather one-sided conversation, seeing as Blondie just nodded along mutely.
“Do you two plan on introducing yourselves or do I have to do everything?”
“Are we keeping him?” Blondie asked suddenly, interrupting the Tall One and shifting his attention to them, his expression morphing into one more upbeat, wide eyes and a silly smile. It was a little scary, how fast it switched, how convincing it was. “Oh, Reg, please can we keep him?”
“He’s not a dog,” the other said, snickering. "Looks a bit like a lost puppy, though."
“Evan Rosier. I’m sure you’ve heard of me. Please don’t ask for an autograph, I don’t have a pen.” Evan laughed. It seemed like a genuine laugh. James couldn’t figure him out.
“Barty,” The Tall One said. Up close, James could see they were roughly the same height. "Plan on going on alone again?"
“Well I wouldn't mind bumming around with you lot." He found himself looking to Regulus, who felt the closest thing to an authority figure in the group. He felt a bit like he was back in school, asking for permission from a teacher to get an extension on an essay. "You know, if you don't mind.” Regulus hummed.
“Right,” he said after a few moments of silence. He looked at Barty, lips pursed, and cocked his head a bit. James’ confused gaze darted between the two, eyebrows pinched, but Barty seemed to quietly understand because he exhaled and turned away.
“I don’t wanna be here while you're interrogating the poor sod. I’m going to go to that cafe we passed, see if there’s any food left after all the looting.” He smiled and threw his arm over Evan’s shoulder. “Come with me, my love. We can hide all the good stuff before they get there.”
“How many times do I have to tell you not to call me that?” Evan groaned. He hit Barty on the back of the head, laughing. “Wanker. I hope they have pudding.” They began to walk off, kicking each other in the ankles and playfully arguing.
“Come meet us when you’ve decided if he makes the cut!” Barty called back over his shoulder.
“Hopefully we haven’t been brutally murdered!” Evan added.
James snickered, then shifted his view to Regulus, who was watching them leave rather intently. He turned to James after a brief period. “You need to learn to control your fear,” he started quietly, monotonous. James tilted his head.
“What?”
“That thing almost killed you.” Regulus gestured to the rotting body nearby.
“Had me pinned, yeah, I was there.”
“Yeah, and you couldn't get it off of you. That’s not okay.” James frowned, a need to defend himself rising in his chest.
“I was close. I could have, had you not, you know…”
“Yeah, she was close too. I’d say fifty-fifty chance. It should not have been able to get that close to you. It’s dead—” He looked back again, and then lowered his voice a bit. “They’re dead, and you’re not. Those things are operating from corpses. They’re slow, weak. It’s an easy fight, especially for you because you're tall and quite fit. You let your fear get in the way.”
As they talked, the two headed toward the alley by them—the one the undead woman came from—and leaned into the shadows, backs against the walls.
“Did you just call me fit, Regulus?”
“Did I just—are you an idiot?”
“You did, I heard it.”
“You’re dumb. This is important.”
“Right.” James sighed. “How can you just—I mean, it’s only been three days. How could you—I can’t just turn off my emotions. I’m a very emotional person, actually, I know I might not look it.”
“James.”
“Especially when I’m drunk. I cry a lot when I’m drunk. Everyone thinks it’s funny because—actually that’s off-topic.”
“James.”
“But turning off fear, that’s… I mean, like I said, it’s only been three days, you know? How can you be an expert at this already? Machete and all—that was kinda cool by the way—”
“James.”
“What?”
“You’re rambling.”
“Am I?” He ran a hand through his hair. “Yeah, you'll get used to it.” Regulus was visibly suppressing a smile.
“I can teach you, if you stay with us.”
“I don’t even know if I want to learn how to do that. Hardly sounds healthy.”
“Maybe not, but it will keep you alive.” James hummed uncertainly. “I’m sure you’ll be able to find a balance. But really, it seems like you suppress your emotions quite well already.” At this, James frowned, brows drawing together.
“What makes you say that?” he asked.
“Never mind. Do you plan on staying with us, or do you plan on dying?”
“You don’t think I’d be able to make it on my own?”
“No. I know for a fact. You’d die in ten minutes.”
“Mean.”
“Yeah, you'll get used to it.” James rested his head on the wall, staring up into the sky. It was mostly cloudless for once, and the sun was just beginning to go down.
“Why would you let me join you? You three seem close. You definitely knew each other before everything went to shit.”
“Yeah,” Regulus said softly. “But I wasn’t going to just let you die. I’m mean, but… I’d like to think I’m not completely heartless.”
“I don’t actually think you’re mean.”
“That’s because you don’t know me. I’m cruel.” Regulus stared ahead blankly, absentmindedly fiddling with the silver rings on his fingers. James decided not to press him.
“Are you going to let anyone you come across join your little group?” he asked.
“Probably not.”
“So why me?” It was quiet for a moment. A bird chirped close by.
“I don’t know,” Regulus admitted. “It might just be my own selfish desire to understand why I’m so drawn to you.” James looked away from the darkening sky, toward Regulus, who continued to look ahead at the wall across from them.
His gaze glided along Regulus’ face almost studiously, taking in every detail. He could see it now—the familial connection between him and his brother. They had the same grey eyes, dark like rain clouds, thunderstorms, but not dull. The same long eyelashes, the same inky black hair, the same pale skin. Even their French-tinged accent was the same.
But mostly they were different. For every similarity, James found a handful of distinctions. Regulus’ hair was curly—Sirius’ was not. He was thin, scrawny, while Sirius was more broad. Regulus’ jawline was sharper, and his nose was bigger. He had a light dusting of freckles peppered across his face.
He was quite breathtaking, if he was being honest.
“Drawn to me?” James asked, because what else was he supposed to say? What the hell was he supposed to do with that?
“If you’re staying, we have some rules,” Regulus said sharply, ignoring the question. He dropped his hands to his sides and adopted a more stony expression. “Firstly, keep your hands off our weapons. You’ll get your own.” He finally veered his attention to James. “Any preferences?”
“Not really,” James said, trying to hide his annoyance. He was getting tired of Regulus saying stuff and then not following it up. “I’ve never really used a weapon,” he said.
“Well you have to find something you’re comfortable using. I have my machete, Evan has some daggers, Barty has his crossbow—God knows where he got that, he always has weird shit. Maybe a hatchet? Or a knife, I’m sure there are plenty of knives at the cafe.”
“Right, the cafe we’re meeting your friends at after—what did Barty call it? An interrogation? You think they have hot cocoa? I love hot cocoa.”
“How would I know? And this isn’t an interrogation. I just need to know if you’re fit to stick with us.”
“So it’s an interview?” Regulus sighed.
“James.”
“I think I’d be a great fit for this company, I have a lot to offer.”
“You’re a moron.”
“You’d be surprised.” The conversation stilled. James noticed the sky was a vivid orange now, shades of pinks and reds swirling throughout like an unkempt paint palette. He wondered if Sirius was watching the sun set wherever he was.
“Knives, hatchets, that sounds really… violent,” James eventually said. Regulus took his time to respond, thinking, filling the air with more quiet that James so badly wanted to squash.
“Life is violent now, James. You’re going to have to get used to it or you’re going to die.” They locked eyes. Regulus’ face was filled with so much seriousness that it went beyond his expression—it was in his aura, seeping from every pore and spilling over.
“Maybe. But that doesn’t mean I have to become violent. I don’t want—I know they’re dead, but…” Regulus let out a long breath.
“Yeah, okay.”
“...Okay?”
“I get that. It's fine. But…” He bit the inside of his cheek. “Ever stop to wonder why Barty took Evan away? Left us alone?”
“Please do not change the subject again,” James grumbled. Regulus wrinkled his nose.
“I’ll have you know, this is quite relevant,” he said, voice biting. “Evan doesn’t like to be around when me or Barty are talking about… well, everything. The monsters and such. He doesn’t like killing them either—hasn’t done it yet. He’d only do it if it were life or death. He will kill to protect himself, though. Or me, or Barty. I need you to be able to do that, too.”
“I don’t know if I can,” James muttered. Regulus groaned, frustration creeping into his face.
“I know you probably grew up real loved, real sheltered, but the world is different now. It will never be the same. It’s dangerous. You need to be able to adapt or you will die. Do you understand?”
James huffed. Of course he understood that—he literally almost died that day, twice! The death of his parents in such a brutal way, and then their attempt in killing him, were practically loud, flashing alarms signifying the end of safety. A world in which that could happen was not the same world he grew up in. He knew it was dangerous now, but he needed time to properly process that.
“It has been three days!” James burst. He felt like they were going in circles. “Just a few hours ago was the first time I’ve left my house since the breakout! How could you possibly have made yourself okay with this already!?” Regulus closed his eyes and took in a breath, relaxing his muscles and calming his tone.
“I guess I’ve had an unfair advantage. Me and Evan and Barty—we grew up around violence. We learned how to control our emotions—our fear—before we even hit puberty.” James blanched, swallowed. He’d heard enough about Walburga and Orion Black through Sirius, but he’d always assumed Regulus was relatively hidden from it all from the way he spoke about it. Regulus opened his eyes again and looked at James. “It’s easy to be violent when that’s all that has surrounded you your whole life.
“Listen, I’m not asking you to become violent; you can keep your stupid morals. I just need to know that if there ever comes a situation where you killing one of those monsters, or a person, would save, say, Barty’s life… I need to know you’d do it.” James faltered, then nodded.
“I’ll do my best, yeah?”
“You better. If one of them dies, and it’s on you, I will not hesitate to kill you.”
“Not even a little bit?” James teased.
“No.”
It was dark now, stars speckled against the murky black of the sky, crescent moon just bright enough that James didn’t feel completely blind. Still, he could only make out Regulus’ silhouette through the shadows. He was fidgeting with his rings again.
“Any more rules before I can join your super-secret boy band?”
“Contribute, I guess. You need us a hell of a lot more than we need you, so pull your weight. And also… I don’t know how you refer to those dead things, but… When Evan is around, try to refer to them as people. Alive people. Sick people. At least for now.”
“Is that why he has trouble killing them? He thinks they’re still…?”
“It’s… complicated. But if he wants you to know, he’d tell you.”
“I don’t like thinking of them as alive.”
“Then don’t. I don’t care how you think of them. I don’t like thinking of them as alive either, just because I know that they’re not, but… Out loud, just pretend. He’s sensitive about it. You’re the odd one out here, remember that.”
“Right. Yeah, sure.”
“Good.”
“Good.”
James exhaled. The air was tense, polluted with the strange type of awkwardness that only ever occurred between strangers. He had to keep reminding himself that that’s what they were—strangers. He knew from Sirius that Regulus played the piano, and that he adored animals—particularly their grumpy cat, Kreacher—and that he loved reading classic literature, and that he’d sucked his thumb until he was seven—but ultimately, James did not know Regulus. They were aliens.
He was so endlessly fascinating to James, though. He wanted them to not be strangers.
He wondered what Sirius would think of that.
Regulus pulled himself away from the wall and took a few brisk but careful steps before squatting down to grab something off the ground. James tipped his head, trying to see what it was, and then Regulus stood back up and returned.
He shoved a dirty metal pipe in his hands, about half a metre in length, the opening roughly five centimetres.
“Here,” he said, like it explained everything.
“A pipe,” James deadpanned, lifting an eyebrow. “Need me to fix a toilet?”
“No, James, a weapon. Non-violent, no blood and whatnot. Probably won’t kill them, either, just good enough to get them away from you. Me and Barty, we can do the killing, but you still need something to protect yourself, so…” he waved his hand flippantly toward the pipe.
“Oh,” James said. He ran his hands along the pipe, finding the spot that balanced perfectly in his palm, and swung it lightly. “Right, that’s—yeah, this will work. Thanks.” Regulus shrugged.
“We should get to the cafe.”
“Does that mean I passed?”
“Sure,” Regulus huffed. James smiled and cheered under his breath.
They made their way out of the alley, James swinging his pipe lazily.
“Thank you, by the way, for saving my life.”
“I’m already starting to regret it.” James laughed, loudly.
“You’re funny,” he said, eyes bright, voice laced with amusement.
“I wasn’t joking,” Regulus responded.
But as they walked down the street, through the moon’s dim lighting, James could see the tug at the corners of his lips.