the_debt_of_time

Chapter Fifty

Catalyst

And you can't fight the tears that ain't coming

Or the moment of truth in your lies

When everything feels like the movies

Yeah, you bleed just to know you're alive

(Iris - Goo Goo Dolls)

June 8th, 1976

Peter had miraculously done what he had set out to do: inform Dumbledore of
Greyback's appearance and Higgs's deception.
As the three Marauders and Mia—now a fully formed pack under Remus as
Alpha—made their way through the forest, they had been cut off by a group of Aurors
and professors with wands drawn. Before anyone caught sight of them, James, Mia, and
Sirius ducked beneath the Invisibility Cloak and slipped through a small grove of trees,
unfortunately, leaving Remus to handle the fallout.
He had explained to Dumbledore and the Aurors what had happened, leaving his
friends' participation out of it, naturally. Greyback stunned him inside the passage beneath
the Whomping Willow, but not before Remus heard him discuss his plans with Professor
Higgs. It was a lie, of course; Remus had been stunned long before Higgs showed up, and
it was Mia, James, and Sirius who had to inform him of their professor's participation in
his abduction.
Remus said his memory was vague after that. He knew that he had transformed at
the full moon and awoke alone in the forest that morning, though he had seen Greyback's
blood on the ground and had assumed that they fought sometime during the night,
especially since Remus himself was wounded.
The Aurors were rude and suspicious—and though they had a right to be,
considering Remus was lying—their mistrust of him had everything to do with his
lycanthropy and nothing to do with his ability to fabricate stories on a whim.
Remus had been escorted to Dumbledore's office where the Aurors questioned him
for two hours, accusing him of being in cahoots with Greyback because of their