Marauders - Always - Part One

We'll Figure Something Out

James Potter sat at his desk in Harry Underhill's office, organizing Underhill's latest notes on the events occurring in Blackburn, where werewolf attacks had been on the rise. He'd paused in his work to stare at a map of the city of Blackburn which had been marked by Underhill to indicate the locations of all of the attacks made over the last two months. Several marks had been made and numbered in order of occurrence, but there was no obvious pattern to the bites to speak of. James frowned and flipped through the folder, pausing to look at victims that had been found dead, their shoulders bitten in the same exact place as James knew Remus Lupin had a half-moon scar, too.

But despite the fact that the bites looked the same as Greyback's work, which had been the conclusion that Underhill had drawn based on evidence gathered from other victim's of Fenrir's that were on file with the Werewolf Registry, there was something different about it that James couldn't quite put his finger on that told him it couldn't be Greyback. He just wasn't sure what that thing was. He frowned and his eyes skimmed the description of the victims. Ages ranging wildly overall, there did seem to be a skew in the average toward the younger generation, with most of the victims being between the ages of 16 to 25. James looked at their photographs and sighed as he flicked through them one by one. Most of the victims that were identified had been killed - a couple had been injured and treated at St. Mungo's. He wondered how many people had been bitten but not hard enough to be killed or need treatment - only enough to change and be occupying Blackburn, infected with lycanthropy, and therefore unknown in the case.

Underhill was pouring over a newspaper, bent forward and rubbing his chin as he read about the latest victim of the Blackburn Werewolf - an eighteen year old girl who was one of the victims being treated at Mungo's. She'd been found three blocks west of the train station, where the previous victim - the boy coming home from school - had been found.

"It's sloppy," James said suddenly.

Underhill looked up from the paper he was reading. "Excuse me?"

James looked up, too. "These attacks are sloppy," James explained.

Underhill raised his eyebrow. "Did you think werewolf attacks were nice neat little things that are done wearing pinafores and drinking tea with your pinkie popped?" he asked with a note of sarcasm.

"I mean they don't have a rhyme or reason to them. But Greyback's always been quite methodical." He paused. "Also, there are bodies - remains. Greyback... he bites to collect into his pack or else to... to eat."

Underhill's eyes lit.

"This is a copycat. Not Greyback himself," James concluded.

"Or Greyback's sending a message," Underhill said.

James shook his head, "Greyback's too much of a greedy bastard. Besides, he's weakened right now. He would be trying to make a show of power toward You Know Who, not allowing any further weakness to show on his part. Guy's got his tail between his legs - now isn't the time that he wants anyone to be finding his -er- leftovers."

Underhill eyed James. "He's weakened?"

"Yeah," James said, "He was recently defeated by one of his omegas so his hold over them is sort of... topsy-turvey. Now's the time to challenge him. If there were werewolves that wanted to try to sort of... overtake the pack... they could potentially do it right now."

"And you know this... how?"

James shrugged.

Underhill rubbed his chin and sat back in his seat, considering.

James did, too, in a motion very similar to Underhill's own.

"Interesting," Underhill mused.

James nodded. He flipped through the sheets before him for a moment, then said, "Could be somebody's trying to make Greyback look even weaker."