Chapter 3
Four Marauders, a ragged Remus, and a soaking wet Regulus walk into the Gryffindor common room. And no, this isn’t the setup to a joke—it’s an unreasonably complicated situation.
“Where is everyone?” Sirius asks as they step into the eerily empty room.
“No clue,” Original Remus replies, his face slowly regaining some color.
“Just follow me,” James says, determined, as he heads toward the girls’ dormitory stairs.
They trail after him, until they’re all gathered outside the door to the Gryffindor girls’ dorm.
“Uh, James,” Peter says nervously, “maybe we shouldn’t—”
“Shut up, Pete. We need to fix this.” With that, James pushes the door open and barges in.
A loud shriek erupts from the other side, and James hastily slams the door shut, his face now bright red.
“Okay, so we just… wait here a second,” James mutters, staring intensely at the floor.
A moment later, Mary Macdonald appears in the doorway, wearing a bathrobe and a scowl.
“What is this?” she asks, glaring at them.
James, who had led the group there, is now completely silent, his eyes still glued to the floor.
Sirius sighs and steps forward. “We have a situation. We need Evans.”
“A situation?” Mary repeats skeptically. “The four of you? I don’t think we’re interested.” She starts to close the door, but Sirius jams his foot in the way.
“No, Mary!” Sirius protests as she reopens it, narrowing her eyes. “We really have a situation.” He steps aside, revealing Regulus, soaked and glaring.
Mary raises an unimpressed eyebrow. “Your baby brother getting caught in the rain is hardly a situation, is it, Black?”
“Wha—no!” Sirius turns and glares. “Damn it, Reggie, why did you and Moony switch places?” With an exaggerated step to the other side, Sirius reveals a second Remus Lupin standing behind him.
Mary’s expression falters. “Oh. Oh, dear.” She sighs, rubbing her temples. “Okay… come in.”
The six boys file into the room, where Lily and Marlene are playing chess. Their chatter stops dead as their gazes land on the second Remus.
“What the fuck is this?” Marlene demands.
Before anyone can answer, Ragged Remus pushes through the group and crashes into her, arms wrapped tightly around her shoulders.
“Marls! Oh, Marls!” he whispers, taking her face in his hands. “I’ve missed you so much.”
“Hi, Remus,” Marlene replies, awkwardly trying to put some space between them.
“What did you do?” Lily cuts in, her sharp gaze landing on Sirius and James.
“Nothing, love, I swear!” James starts, raising his hands in defense, but Regulus interrupts with a furious hiss.
“YOU’RE WITH HER?! And you call her ‘love’?!”
“What is going on with you?” Sirius snaps at his brother.
Lily looks thoroughly baffled.
“Lils, you have to help us!” James pleads. “We were just hanging about when Lupin 2.0 apparated into the middle of our dorm, closely followed by him”—he points at Regulus—“and something is definitely off with both of them!”
“Nothing is off about me,” Regulus spits, “except for the fact that my boyfriend just admitted he’s dating someone else!”
“BOYFRIEND?!” Sirius yells. “How could you, Prongs?!”
“I DIDN’T!” James shouts, panic creeping into his voice. “I’m with Lily! You know that!” He turns desperately to Lily. “I swear, I have never been Regulus Black’s boyfriend!”
“Real classy, James,” Regulus mutters, pouting.
“What… the fuck,” Mary breathes, echoing the thoughts of everyone in the room.
Then another loud CRACK echoes, and a second Regulus Black appears in the middle of the room.
The entire group whirls to stare at the new arrival.
The new Regulus, completely unfazed, grins and strides over to James. “Hello, love,” he says smoothly before grabbing James and kissing him square on the mouth.
The room erupts into chaos.
James frantically tries to explain to Lily that he is, in fact, not secretly dating Sirius’ Death Eater brother behind her back. The first Regulus is threatening to murder the second Regulus in cold blood for kissing his man, while Sirius is threatening to murder both Reguluses, and James too. Meanwhile, the original Remus is trying to console the ragged Remus, who’s having a complete Marlene-induced meltdown in the corner.
It’s mayhem.
“EVERYONE SHUT UP!” Lily’s voice cuts through the chaos. She’s standing on a table, glaring down at them all.
The room falls silent.
Lily closes her eyes and takes a deep breath. “Calm down,” she says, her voice low and firm. Another deep breath. “Okay. Calm down,” she repeats, this time more to herself.
Then she starts to laugh.
It begins as a soft giggle but quickly morphs into full-blown hysterics.
“Lils,” James says cautiously.
She keeps laughing.
“Lily,” he tries again, offering a hand to help her down from the table. She doesn’t take it.
“No, no,” she chokes out between fits of laughter.
“Please come down,” James pleads.
“I can’t, James!” she gasps, clutching her stomach. “I CAN’T! I can’t, because there are two Remuses! And two Reguluses, who are somehow both in love with my boyfriend! Oh, God, I feel dizzy.” She wavers slightly, pressing a hand to her forehead.
“Okay, down we go,” Original Remus says as he gently lifts her off the table.
Lily takes a deep steadying breath.
“You seem awfully calm about all this,” Sirius remarks, raising an eyebrow.
“Well, the second me is old news,” Remus replies, gesturing to the new Regulus.
“So,” Mary says, breaking the uneasy silence. “What are we going to do?”