ink - sirius black

mystery and suspicion

finally. im sorry this took so damn long.

March 9, 1978
6:08 pm
Hospital Wing

Things were getting very scary very fast.

Sirius's knees ached with bruising pain from kneeling on the stone hospital wing floor next to Regulus's bed for so long, but he didn't care as long as he could keep watching over his little brother that he had so horribly failed to protect.

Regulus's fairy like features were completely restful, chest rising and falling with a steady, slow rhythm. There was a curl of dark hair resting out of place on his forehead, making him look even younger and more vulnerable.

Sirius nimbly moved his hand forward to brush it out of the way before looking up to McGonagall, Slughorn and Pomfrey with a cold, pained expression.

"How did this happen?" he asked, voice just as steel as his eyes. "Who did this to him?"

"We don't know," McGonagall said, tone forcefully steady. "A fourth year Hufflepuff student found him while looking for their lost wand, and they immediately found Slughorn, who found me since I'm serving in Dumbledore's potion for the time being."

"Is there any way to tell how long he's been like this?" Sirius pressed. "So we can narrow down the suspects? Do we even have any suspects?"

"Not at the moment, no," McGonagall sighed apologetically, and Black squeezed his eyes shut in frustration. "But we're planning on asking around to see if students saw anything suspicious. The process will take a long time, but hopefully we'll catch whoever is behind this."

"Hopefully?" Sirius repeated. "My brother's life is riding on hopefully?"

None of the adults said anything as they looked down at the boy pressing his forehead against the white, boring sheets. They didn't want to answer him, didn't want to depress him any further than the potential loss of his brother already was.

Black's mind flitted again to the drop of blood on Anneliese's shoe, but pushed away the doubt in his stomach. Callaway's life was far from uneventful. It could have been from anything.

"So what can we do?" Sirius asked, in need of some good news. "Is there anything at all?"

"There's no use in trying to keep this under wraps, the whole school probably knows by now by the way things spread here," McGonagall said plainly. "So we're starting questioning in a matter of minutes with the seventh years and going down from there, each head of house taking their own students."

"Can I stay with him while you do that?" Sirius asked, tone almost begging. "Please?"

"Of course," McGonagall said with a firm nod. "If anything happens or progress is made, you will be one of the first to know."

"If anything happens or any progress is made, Sirius is going to be one of the first people to know," Frank pointed out wisely, smoking a rare cigarette as he paced across the common room. "So we can just ask him."

Anneliese slumped further on the couch, picking at a hole in the fabric of her sheer black tights with a frown. She knew she shouldn't be ripping the stocking further, but it was just a coping mechanism for stress at this point.

"If he even is gonna want to talk about it," she said in a soft tone, moving her eyes up to Frank, who was still pacing. "I know I wouldn't in his place."

"Yea, well at a point, he has to talk," Marlene said in a hard tone. "Because if no one tells me, then I'm going to figure out what's going on myself. I'm too curious for this bullshit."