Black Rose [Regulus Black]

19 - astronomy obsessions & awkward dinners

"I'm bored."

Regulus grunted as he rolled off of the couch and stood up, stretching his arms. "We still haven't found anything."

"I know, but we've been at it for hours," Alessandra groaned, flopping off the couch on to the floor. "I don't think I've read this much in my entire life."

"But we need to find something and we need to do it fast," he insisted, fully invested in the task of finding Horcruxes. A lot was at stake for him, not just his life but probably Alessandra's as well. If the Dark Lord found out about his treachery, the man would make sure she was six feet under before wiping him off the Earth too.

"I know," she repeated, and she did know that he was right. The sooner they got this over with, the better, because his life was on the line and if anyone found out about what Reg had done, he'd probably end up dead. "My brain just feels like a big pile of spaghetti at this point, I just can't comprehend anything I'm reading anymore."

He pursed his lips, feeling awful for dragging her into all this. "Let's take a break then."

"Thank God," she mumbled, her head flopping onto the table, and she glanced at him sideways. "How many do you think he has?"

"I have no idea," he admitted.

"So, what, we find as many as we can, and just when we think we've found enough, it's revealed that he has more than we thought, and we end up dying?"

"Pretty much."

She stared at him, shocked. "This is a suicide mission."

"Yep."

"So there's absolutely nothing you know about him? I mean he had to have been an actual human being before this, do you have any information on that?"

"No, nobody knows."

"Nobody," she echoed. "Have you asked Dumbledore? That man's a fossil, surely he would know."

"I don't think he knew about the Horcruxes until I told him, so I don't think he'd know about how many of them there are."

"No, but he would know Moldywart, right? All villains start somewhere."

He contemplated it. As much as he hated the very idea of asking Dumbledore for help, she did have a point. That old coot was a bloody know-it-all, and he was the leader of the Order, so he would've had some basic understanding of who his enemy was. He had to.

"I guess we could ask him," Reg grumbled, really not wanting to interact with the Order more than necessary, out of safety and out of spite.

If Sandra was a dog, her ears would have perked up. "Perfect. So now that we've done something, can we please stop this? My brain hurts."

He huffed. "Fine."

"Thank God," she sighed.

A few moments of silence passed. Then —

"I'm still bored."

"What do you want to do then? It's midnight."

"I don't know," she whined. "I'm just bored."

He rolled his eyes, frustrated because nothing had come out of hours' long research and because she was being so vague and his brain wasn't functioning enough to come up with something. He just wanted to go home to his telescopes-

"I have an idea."

Ten minutes later, he was fervently tugging a shivering Alessandra by her arm, and for once in his entire life, he was actually excited to go back Number 12 Grimmauld Place.