GOOD DOG || Sirius Black

(Forty Nine: The Flaw in the Plan)

Three in the morning.

It was three in the morning.

This simple fact allows us to articulate that it is totally implausible to expect anyone to be up at this hour. And this knowledge alone was how she had known he would be.

Someone had convinced Sirius to go back home- to the Potter's- hours before, and he was stuck on a sofa in the garage, kicking himself for losing his focus that day. If he could've just kept a lid on his temper, he could've asked the Shadow Man what happened next, to Alex, to him.

He didn't care about the bigger picture. The way things were going, he might not get a chance to even glimpse it, never mind eat olives and sip wine patronisingly as he viewed it in a local gallery fifty years from now.

But even he couldn't fight against human biology, and his eyes felt the strain with every minute they stayed open. The sofa felt so inviting, and-

Crash! Crash! Crash!

Sirius shot upright.

That sound, if you are unaware, is the noise a garage door makes if someone is knocking on it.

Rubbing his eyes, Sirius reached for the latch at the base of the sheet of metal. His heart was pounding for some unknown reason, the feeling you get when you think you're alone and then someone speaks.

He meant to catch the door as it swung upwards, but his exhausted eyes found the figure on his doorstep, and he couldn't quite get his arm to move.

CRASH!

The whole room shuddered with the impact of the metal slamming against the ceiling.

"Alex?" Sirius asked before he could stop himself.

In the low light, and in the clothes he had borrowed from Remus that had belonged to her, she really did still look like the girl who stood on Logan Mitchell's rooftop with him and set off Filibuster Fireworks at the advancing Death Eaters.

She pulled a face, "Not Alex. The other one."

"Right." Sirius blinked, mentally slapping himself, "How did you get out of your cell?"

"Am I not supposed to be able to do that?" New asked curiously, "Sorry, still so much to learn."

"What are you doing here?" Sirius felt suddenly angry, "You said it yourself, you aren't her. Why the hell are you beating down my door at three in the morning?"

New studied him with narrowed eyes for a moment, "What are we?"

"Excuse me?" Sirius raised his eyebrows.

"They took me in for a Psyche." New explained, "There were all these pictures of people I- Alex- knew. And I knew all the words for them. Logan Mitchell was my friend. Micah was my brother. Remus was my werewolf sire."

Sirius leaned against the side of the garage and crossed his arms, "So? I expect a mental examination is the standard for someone who murders four people and then goes out for lunch."

"They showed me a picture of you."

"Yeah, well, I knew Alex." Sirius dismissed, "Still waiting for the 'wow' factor in this story. Maybe you should've come up with a catchier opening paragraph."

"We weren't a word."

He paused, "What?"

"You weren't her friend." It seemed almost like New was stumbling through her sentences. He'd never heard her do that before. It made her seem more like Alex. He hated it, "Or her brother. You weren't family. And I can't- I thought I understood everything she did, but I still don't understand what you were."