We’ve Got a Lot of Explaining to Do
“James,” Sirius whined, dragging his feet as James pulled him along across the lawn.
“You have to come to dinner Sirius,” James insisted, turned back toward him as they continued to walk.
“I’m sleepy,” Sirius whined again, honestly he was. It was late, and he and Remus had been having such a good time sitting around together.
Remus said he wasn’t feeling very well and he’d stayed behind when James came to collect him for dinner.
“You can sleep when you’re dead,” James joked lightly, but Sirius flinched slightly at his words - unable to stop thinking about his little brother. “We’re doing a campfire for you tonight.”
“That’s nice…” Sirius smiled slightly, happy to feel so welcomed by the group of demigods. “What’s for dinner?”
“Oh you’ll love this,” James grinned mischievously. Sirius didn’t have time to respond before they came over the crest of the hill and a large campfire with picnic benches and a table surrounding it came into view. James waved to a few people and dragged Sirius down the hill at a light jog.
“James,” the same blonde girl from when Sirius had first woken up ran up and pulled James into a hug.
“Hi Mar,” James grinned, wrapping his arm around her shoulder. “Remember Sirius?”
“Yeah,” the blonde girl laughed lightly, her eyes squinting as she smiled. “I’m Marlene.”
“Hello,” Sirius saved shyly, suddenly feeling the wave of anxiety wash away slowly.
“Come on let’s get you some food,” Marlene took his hand and dragged him over to the picnic table - which had an array of food that was fit for a barbecue. Marlene took a plate and began filling it with some fries and a burger, Sirius followed suit only now realizing he hadn’t had anything since the bagel he’d been given that morning.
“Oh here’s the best part,” Marlene smirked, grabbing a cup. “Cherry Vanilla Dr. Pepper,” she said confidently, and Sirius wanted in awe as the cup filled itself with the fizzy drink seemingly out of nowhere. “You can ask for anything at all,” she explained, taking a sip of her own drink.
“Cool,” Sirius smiled, picking up his own cup. “Pineapple Fanta.”
He couldn’t help but smile as the yellow liquid filled his glass, Marlene poked his arm and nodded for him to follow her to a table where James was sitting.
Sirius plopped down on the bench next to James and across from Marlene. There were a couple of other people at the table as well, a small boy - who looked around Regulus’ age - with bright blonde hair and freckles, a girl with beautiful braids - who Sirius thought looked very cool - and an older girl with silky dark brown hair - who looked disturbingly familiar.
“Sirius, this is Dorcas,” James gestured to the girl with braids, “Andi,” the girl with the dark brown hair smiled and waved - her hand wrapped up in a bandage. “And Evan,” the little blonde boy waved cautiously.
“Hello,” Sirius smiled and waved back to everyone.
“Do you want us to do the whole welcome spiel?” Dorcas asked with a laugh, glancing at Marlene who smirked back.
“I mean sure,” James shrugged. “I’ll start,” Sirius scrunched his brows together. “I’m James, I’m the son of Apollo, and one of my dreams is to be the head healer.”
“I’m Marlene,” Sirius hated introducing himself… “I’m also an Apollo kid, and I want to take over for Frank as councilor when I get older.”
“Ugh,” Dorcas grounds, throwing her head back, James giver her a pointed look and she glares, “Okay okay fine, I’m Dorcas. I’m unclaimed, and my eventual goal is to master my magic shit.”
“Magic shit?” Sirius raises an eyebrow.
“Yeah,” Dorcas shrugged, then raised her hand and Marlene’s fork begins to levitate.
“Woah,” Sirius grins. “That’s really cool.”
“Eh,” Dorcas dropped her hand and the fork went tumbling down back onto the table.
“Oh don’t sell yourself short,” Andi laughs, flicking Dorcas’ arm slightly. “I’m Andromeda, or Andi - whatever you prefer. I’m the Athena councilor, and honestly, I just want to survive. Fucking monsters are annoying,” she laughed.
“They really are,” James chuckled, giving Sirius a soft smile. “Evan?”
“Oh uh yeah,” the little blonde boy muttered. “I’m Evan, no clue who my parent is, and I guess I just want to figure out what exactly I am…”
“You’ll get there Ev,” James nudges him, and the boy smiles slightly.
“Can I go back to the cabin and see Remus?”
“Yeah of course.”
The boy jumped up quickly and scurried off across the lawn without another word, Sirius couldn’t help but think that Regulus would get along with him without a hitch.
“He’s shy,” Marlene said through a bite of her food.
“Not to mention his fucking powers,” Dorcas continues, “he’s crazy…”
“Yeah he can manipulate shit, mostly light which is insane-” James took a sip of his coke, “it’s a wonder no one’s claimed him.”
“It’s dumb that not everyone’s claimed,” Sirius remarked.
“I like this one,” Dorcas laughed.
“Why thank you,” Sirius grinned, feeling much more comfortable.
“You excited about Capture the Flag tomorrow?” Marlene asks, taking a bite out of her burger.
“I think so? James says it’s fun,” Sirius shrugs, he doesn’t really know what Capture the Flag with weapons will be like - especially since he’s never actually held a real weapon aside from the pen sword thing from the day before.
“It will be,” Marlene assured him, “Andi will probably pick you for her team. Mary and Bella don’t like new kids very much.”
“Mary likes new kids,” James gasped dramatically. “If they’re good at winning. And Bella isn’t co-captain.”
“Yeah my sister is a bit of a manipulative bitch,” Andi laughed. A roll suddenly flew at her head.
“You talking shit about me Andi?” A voice teased from a few tables away.
“What? Me? Never?” Andi laughed, sticking her tongue out over her shoulder.
“You’ve got a sister?” Sirius craned his neck to see who’d thrown the bread.
“Two yeah,” she laughed, pulling a piece of the bread off the roll and popping it into her mouth. “Bella! Cissa!”
“Are they Athena kids too then?” Sirius asked as he watched two girls from another table get up and start to walk over, he also caught sight of Lily sitting with another girl with coily black hair. She looked happy.
“No…” Andi pursed her lips, “Long story really, my father’s kind of crazy, and their mum… yikes-”
“Yikes is a mild word to describe our family,” a girl with platinum blonde hair laughed, swinging herself into the open seat next to Andromeda.
“Understatement of the year really,” the girl that Sirius had met earlier snorted, now side by side with Andromeda he could really see the similarities. They both just looked scarily familiar.
“Sirius knows about dysfunctional families,” James elbowed him gently.
“Dysfunctional,” Sirius smirked, “James darling must I remind you that I ran away yesterday.”
“Okay fair,” James chuckled. “He honestly might have just as much of a screwed-up family as you three do.”
“Sirius sounds like such a familiar name,” the blonde crunched her brows together. “Isn’t that Uncle Orion’s new wife’s kid’s name?”
Sirius almost spit out his Fanta, “I’m sorry did you say Uncle Orion?”
“Yeah? He’s our stepfather’s brother and Andi’s dad’s brother,” Bella explained.
“Oh fuck,” James’ eyes widened, “oh how did I not connect the dots- Lily! Lily come here!”
“What didn’t you connect the dots on Potter?” Marlene and Dorcas questioned as Lily walked up to the table.
“Lily we’re so fucking stupid,” James jumped up. Whispering something into her ear.
“Oh Gods,” she flicked her eyes between Sirius and the girls at the end of the table. “How did we not see it?”
“See what?” all four concerned parties concerned said simultaneously.
“Sirius, meet Andromeda, Narcissa, and Bellatrix Black,” James gestured to the girls.
Sirius stopped short for a moment, “Oh! Holy fuck you’re his nieces?”
“You’re his stepson?” The blonde asked - Sirius assumed she was Narcissa.
“Unfortunately yeah,” Sirius mumbled. “Me and my little brother.”
“Orion doesn’t have two step-sons,” Cissa cocked her head slightly.
“Yes he does,” Sirius crossed his arms over his chest. He had a little brother, he always had one, whether or not Orion would accept it.
“Okay…” she shrugged, obviously not getting the point that Sirius was trying to make, but dropping the subject anyways.
“So we're all like fucked up cousins?” Bella asked, and the way her nose crunched up slightly Sirius could tell she didn’t like the thought.
“I suppose so?” Sirius shrugged, “Isn't everyone here cousins anyways?”
“Yeah but we don’t really think about it like that just because of the whole incest thing within the gods,” James explained. “Everyone in your cabin is your sibling but other than that it doesn’t matter.”
“Cool,” Sirius nodded shortly, still trying to wrap his head around the fact that he was sitting at a table with his distant relatives and technical cousins.
“Bellaaaa-” the girl Lily had been sitting with whined from the other table. “We need to finish plotting.”
“I’m coming!” Bella called over her shoulder, “Well this was fun. But don’t for a moment think that because you’re our cousin that we’ll go easy on you tomorrow.”
“Okay?” Sirius’ voice cracked. She was scary, and not only because she reminded him of Orion.
The girls left along with Lily, and Sirius spent the rest of the night laughing and joking around with James and his friends.
He liked Marlene a lot, and Dorcas was sweet to Sirius - but he thought that it would wear off because she was quite mean to James and Marlene (in a friendly way of course). Andromeda was sweet, she had a motherly sense to her that Sirius felt very comfortable around. And of course, he loved James, he was a presence that would always have the ability to calm Sirius down if he was anxious.
Remus was asleep by the time Sirius made it back to the cabin, he desperately wanted to talk to him though. There was something about his honey voice that Sirius loved. Dorcas was still out on the lawn with Marlene and James, and though Sirius could make out a few shapes laying in bed he didn’t think there was anyone awake.
He crept over to his bunk and peeked over the top rail just to see if Remus was awake. There was soft snoring coming from under the covers and Sirius decided to drop it, climbing into his own bed and settling down.
If Regulus were here Sirius might think he was in heaven.
☪
“Okay, team!” Andi smiled at the group of kids standing in front of her. “Let's talk strategy yes?”
Everyone murmured and nods in agreement. “Alright so we’ve got our archers,” she nods over to where James and Marlene are standing with a few other kids who Sirius assumes are also Apollo kids.
“Frank, James you two divide and conquer however you’d like, you always seem to do a pretty amazing job!”
“Aw thanks, Andi,” an older-looking boy with messy brown hair smiled.
“Yeah yeah,” she waved her hand, “Remus, you and Dorcas go scout ahead and tell us all what’s going on yes?” The two nodded, “Fab, Gid, take your kids and wreak havoc doing whatever you want alright?”
There are more instructions that Sirius zones out for, his mind is in a totally different world right now. He’d slept awfully the night before, he kept dreaming about some dark castle, he didn’t know where it was or why it mattered but it freaked him out thoroughly each time it came to mind.
“Sirius, Evan will show you what to do alright? The basic objective is to not get hit with any kind of paint.”
“Paint?”
“Yeah well unfortunately we can’t actually fatally wound anyone so…” James pulls an arrow out of his quiver. “We use paint to determine if you’re down or not.” He shows Sirius how the tips of their arrows are just a little foam balls with paint on them.
“What about the people with swords?” Sirius asked.
“You spar with them, no one will actually try and kill you,” the little blonde boy shrugs. “I’ve got you covered.”
“Take a sword just in case Sirius,” Andromeda pulls a plain silver sword out of a basket of assorted weapons and hands it to him.
“I have no idea how to use this,” Sirius said as he takes it.
“You’ll get the hang of it,” James claps him on the back. “Good luck getting the flag!”
“Getting the flag?” Sirius gapes.
“Yeah Evan’s our runner, and since you don’t really know how to fight much we just stuck you two together,” Marlene explained. “He’s good at staying hidden.”
“If he’s slow I’m leaving him behind,” Evan says bluntly.
“Fair enough,” Andromeda shrugs. There's a long blast of a horn and everyone starts to run, “Good luck! Oh, and Evan try and avoid Bella and Mary alright? We don’t need Sirius to get into close combat with either of them on his second day.”
“Yeah yeah,” the younger boy waves her off as she runs in the opposite direction. “Let's go then, Black.”
“Right yeah,” Sirius straps the sword around his torso and follows Evan at a light jog. “Hey, Evan?”
“Mhm?” the other boy hums. Ducking behind some bushes.
“Where’s Remus?”
He smirks, “he plays for Lily. He’s probably guarding the flag with Mary, or he’s trying to find me. I’m always the runner, they know my tricks too.”
“Why don’t you ever switch it up then?” Sirius asked.
“Well I do, and also they’ve never actually caught me before,” Evan explains.
“You’ve never gotten hit by paint?”
“Well…” Evan clicks his tongue. “I have, but I can do this thing with colors…” he closes his eyes for a moment, and suddenly his black long sleeve is bright pink. It only stays like that for a moment before it snaps back to black and Evan opens his eyes. “It takes a lot of energy but if I get hit with paint I can just change the color to match my shirt.”
“That’s so cool,” Sirius grinned.
“I guess,” he shrugs. “I just wish someone thought I was important rough to claim.”
“Hey you’ll get there I promise,” Sirius nudges him.
“You’ve known me less than a day,” he deadpans.
“Yeah but… you just remind me of someone.”
“Okay,” he brushes past Sirius slightly. “How do you feel about trees?”
“Uh?”
Five minutes later Sirius found himself crouching in a pine tree as Evan found a close enough branch for them to climb onto the next tree. People were laughing and shouting in the distance and Evan claimed he knew where they were hiding the flag. They were staying off the ground because Evan could get a ‘better view’ which Sirius personally thought was psychotic because who the hell wanted to be this far off the ground?
“Come on then,” Evan says quietly, scooting across a thin branch that Sirius doubted would hold but he followed anyway. “Okay, now we need to step down onto that branch there.”
About three feet below them was a much sturdier-looking oak branch.
“Why did I agree to this again?” Sirius signs as he watches Evan swing his body down onto the other branch.
“No clue,” Evan laughs gently. “I’m really only doing this to fuck with you.”
“What?!” Sirius screeched.
Evan shrugs, a smirk falling onto his lips. “It was funny.”
Oh, this little shit… Sirius groaned as he mimicked the movement Evan had done a moment before to get onto the next branch.
“You would be best friends with my brother y’know?”
“If he likes messing with you then I’m sure we’d get along swimmingly.”
Oh, Regulus would love this kid, Sirius just needed to get his brother back.
“Why-” Evan held up a finger for him to be quiet and pointed down.
Around 100 feet away on the ground was a creek, where a bright orange flag was stuck in the ground. The issue with this of course was Mary, Bella, and Lily had not left it defenseless. Remus and a girl - who Sirius assumed was Mary were chatting a few feet away from it, both armed and ready to defend the flag.
“I’ll get the flag and you distract them,” Evan whispered.
“Distract them?!” Sirius hissed, did this kid think he could actually hold his own?
“Mary will chase me, you just need to distract Remus,” he glared for a moment, “and I think you can do that very well.”
Sirius felt his cheeks grow hot - no no not right now. “Yeah alright fine…”
“Good,” Evan nodded and began to climb down quietly, the two other campers hadn’t seen them quite yet but Sirius was sure they would soon. “Ready?” he asked as soon as they were on the ground - crouching behind a tree.
Sirius nodded, though he wasn't exactly sure what he should be ‘ready’ for.
Evan nodded quickly, standing up and painting left - Sirius took that as which way he should be going, and luckily he was right because a moment later Evan dashed out to the right and Sirius ran to the left.
“Oh, you little shit!” the girl yelled, fumbling with her swords as Evan wrapped his fingers around the flag pole and yanked it out of the ground.
“Catch me if you can,” Evan taunted, taking off with Mary at his heels.
Remus took a few steps to follow but Sirius had come into the clearing by then and the other boy stopped dead in his tracks.
“I’m impressed,” Remus smirked. “I really didn’t think you’d make it this far.”
“Don’t underestimate me Lupin,” Sirius grinned, raising a brow.
“You know I’m going to kick your ass right?” Remus dropped two daggers into his hands.
“Oh I’m aware,” Sirius replied, drawing his own sword. Which just felt unbalanced and strange in his hand - nothing like the pen-sword he’d been given before.
“Good,” Remus smirked again, and Sirius loved the way the corner of his eyes crinkled up just a little bit as he did.
In hindsight, he really should have been paying more attention to Remus’ actual move rather than how nice his smile was.
Remus lunged at him with his daggers and Sirius quickly ducked.
“Fuck,” Sirius rolled out of the way.
“Come on Sirius,” Remus rolled his eyes. “You held your own earlier.”
“Yeah in a sparing lesson with you telling me what to do!” Sirius defended himself.
“Fair enough,” Remus laughed. “Use the landscape to your advantage yeah?”
“How?” Sirius yelped as Remus came towards him again, this time he tripped backward over a rock in the leaves on the bank of the creek and fell backward.
Sirius should have been surprised when the water caught him, but after the last couple of days he’d had nothing much was phasing him.
“What the fuck…” Remus gaped as the water formed a small bubble behind Sirius.
The horn signaling the end of the game sounded and both Sirius and Remus stood in silence for a minute, the calming noise of water gently flowing around Sirius made his lips curl up in a smile.
There was the sound of cheering coming closer and closer as Remus continued to stare at Sirius from a few feet away, his daggers had fallen onto the ground underneath him.
“You really are-” he was cut off by the sudden appearance of people gathering around the creek, everyone seemed to stop breathing for a moment. And Sirius was confused, what had he done? Everyone here had magic, didn’t they? What was so special about him being able to control water?
“Sirius…” James gaped at him.
“What?” Sirius asked, struggling to keep his voice steady.
No one answered, they just stared, and honestly, Sirius wanted to run away and cry at that moment. Had he done something wrong?
Then he noticed it, just as the sun dipped beneath the treeline, a faint blue glow in the reflection of the water.
He glanced up.
Oh…
Above his head was a light blue symbol, it kinda looked like a fork… and Sirius couldn’t exactly remember what it was called. But he did remember it belonged to Poseidon.
James had said that the ‘big three’ didn’t have kids… But then why was he being claimed by him?
“What’s going on?” Minnie’s sharp voice cut through the silence. She broke through the crowd - all gathered around Sirius - then she stopped.
The seconds of silence that followed hurt Sirius’ soul.
“James, take him up to the big house please, we need to tell Mr. D…”
“Okay-” James nodded slowly, taking a step toward Sirius.
“What does this mean Jamie…?” Sirius asked quietly.
“It means we’ve got a lot to explain to you…” James gave him a tight smile, reaching out his hand for Sirius to take. “But it also means were going to get Regulus back.”