The Marauders - Order of the Phoenix - Part Two

You Need to See This

Frank Longbottom led the way across the atrium to the security station, where they both weighed their wands. Frank took the badge that printed out for James when they got to the elevator. 

"What're you doing?"

"You said it's top secret, yeah?" Frank aimed his wand at the badge. The letters rearranged themselves. "There."

"Steje Portam?" James read it, looking up.

"I dunno, maybe it's French?"

James shrugged and stuck the badge back on.

Down through the Ministry the elevator travelled and Frank glanced at his watch, then over at Steje and he muttered, "They're going to wonder what the hell we're up to at this hour anyway. What am I to tell the Prewetts tomorrow when they ask?"

"I dunno."

The elevator reached the bottom floor and they stepped out into the corridor. Frank waved for James to follow and he looked about uneasily. Everything was so secure on this floor, doors of iron with tiny barred windows, and he recognized the green tiled walls from the backgrounds of wizarding photographs in the Daily Prophet that showed booking photos of witches and wizards headed for Azkaban.

"Right down here," Frank directed, and they turned down a short hallway and came to the morgue. 

It was locked, but Frank touched the knob and his fingerprints must've passed some security detection of some sort - James was very glad he'd enlisted an actual auror instead of just donning his suit and trying to do this himself now - and they stepped inside. The desk was empty, the mortician gone home for the night hours ago. 

James paused at the desk. "They'd have personal artifacts here if he'd taken them from the bodies, yeah?"

"Probably. Maybe in one of the drawers?" Frank answered. They both turned to the desk and started pulling open drawers and James started digging through one that was cluttered with miscellaneous things while Frank turned to a large filing cabinet and rifled through large manila envelopes. "Here's the file," Frank said, pulling one out that was labelled "BLACK, REGULUS A."

James went over and they opened the envelope, dumping the contents onto the desktop. Several photographs fell out, along with a couple of slips of paper. No watch, no pendent. James picked up the photographs and his stomach dropped so that he had to push them away quickly - they were of Regulus, laying on the floor of the bathroom entrance of the Ministry. His body lay on the tile floor, unmoving so that James couldn't even tell if it was a magical photograph or a muggle one that had taken it. 

"Oh." He covered his mouth and turned away from the photos. He hadn't expected the amount of emotion that struck him in that moment. 

Frank picked them up and put them back into the envelope. "Are you okay?"

James nodded.

Frank hesitated. "James, are you sure you want to look at the body?"

He couldn't bring himself to nod. He wanted to nod, but he couldn't bring himself to do it. He closed his eyes.

"It's OK if you don't."

"I have to know if it's him."

"I'll look."

"Alright."

James felt like a coward.  But it wasn't death itself that was making him sick like this, it was that it was Regulus. Regulus who saved his life multiple times, who had been so brave and stood up against Voldemort so many times, who had snuck information to James at his own peril...

Frank pushed open the door to the morgue and stepped inside. James could hear Frank's feet on the tile and heard him moving about. James stood, arms crossed over his chest, staring at his trainers. It went quiet in the room.