Peter had again awoken from a nightmare, but this one entirely unrelated to anything else - it had been a nightmare of the sorting hat swallowing him up and him having the sensation of falling and waking up as he landed and in the dream would have gone splat - but instead found himself awake in bed. But in the dark he heard tears and he saw Remus's shoulders shaking, his back turned to the room.

"R-Remus?" Peter stammered.

He'd turned his head to look at Peter.

"Are - are you alright?" Peter asked.

Remus nodded and wiped his eyes with a sleeve-covered fist, "I'm - I'm alright. Go back to sleep."

"Are you thinking about your mum?" Peter asked.

Remus stared at him, his jaw quivered and he nodded.

"I'm sorry, Remus," Peter whispered.

Remus started crying in earnest then, and his shoulders shook as his face crumpled little puppy-dog like whimpers escaped him and Peter's heart wrenched. He hurried to roll out of bed and rushed over and leaned over the edge of the bed, flinging his arms about Remus's neck. Remus pressed his face into Peter's arm and hugged back and as he cried, Peter stared at the framed photograph of her on Remus's nightstand - something Sirius, even now, realized he'd never noticed before. 

"She was beautiful," Peter said, staring at the photo.

Remus whispered, "The most beautiful woman in the world."

Peter nodded.

A fair good amount of people would agree with Remus.

And then another night, another year... Sirius in dog form lay on his own bed across the room - the tension in the room palpable, even in the darkness. Peter lay, staring at the ceiling, and beyond him so did Remus.

Peter said into the dark, "It's going to be okay, Remus..."

"I hope so."

"It will. It has to be."

"Or, it isn't, and I lost my best friend."

Peter was quiet, then he whispered, "If he stops being your friend o-over something so - so silly as this, then..." Peter was quiet a second, then he said quickly, "Then I'll be your new best friend and I promise stuff like this wouldn't make me stop. I promise. So you - you'll have a best friend no matter what and always, okay?"

Remus had looked over and Peter did, too, and their eyes met...

The Fat Lady was smirking at Peter, fixing her large pouf of pinkish-blonde hair, pretending at ignoring him while Peter struggled for about the millionth time with the password. "The list of passwords is in my trunk," Peter said, "Let me through and I'll go get  it and bring it back to you and then I'll tell you any password you want. Please - please. Please."

"That's not the way a password works!" the Fat Lady chirped.

"Let me in!" he demanded, hot tears on his face as he banged against the portrait frame in desperation. 

"Peter!" it was Bilius Weasley. "...what's the matter?"

"It's the other First Years..." Peter trembled, "They've been awful to me. They all get along bangingly and they just... never include me. I think they'd just rather if I wasn't even here."

And guilt flooded Sirius then, as he watched this, because how many times had he thought that very thing? Especially in those younger years. How much he'd wished Peter would just - just go away... and he was flooded by a hundred thoughts and memories of himself, and of James, saying precisely that.

"Merlin's stinky socks, Pete - you aren't our bleeding shadow, go on somewhere, will you?" Sirius's voice echoed.

"Yeah, get lost Pete, we're busy," James said in that arrogant little twelve year old voice of his.

And Peter sitting on a flight of stairs, crying... crying because even though he was a Marauder, it wasn't because they chose him. 

Why wasn't he ever the one who was chosen?

But he was chosen in a way, wasn't he? He was the lucky one? He was a wizard after all.

He could've been a squib.

Like Maggie.

"Say Pete, tell me about your sister," Sirius was saying. "Why are you being dodgy?"

"She's a squib, alright? A squib!"

Sirius sat up. "A squib? You're not serious?"

Peter stared at Sirius. Part of him wanted to say the joke but he was too sad, the topic too heavy to let himself joke about it. "It runs in my family," Peter said, "Which is probably why I'm so bloody terrible at everything. I'm probably one step off from being a ruddy squid myself!"

The grin melted away from Sirius's face.

"I'm sorry mate, I didn't mean to tease you before."

"It's alright."

"Let me know if you need any help. Seriously."

"Thanks. I'll be alright, I hope."

"You will. You're not a squib. You're a very talented wizard, Peter. You just need to stop worrying so much and it'll get better, I promise. You're a Marauder, you're one of us. We're all here for you, okay?"

Peter nodded vigorously. The words meant so much to him. Sirius had had no idea then what magnitude they had in Peter's perspective, how much Peter clung to those words...

"You know what? I have something that I'd like to show you. I think it'll help. C'mon." Bilius Weasley was pulling Peter up from the stairs and leading him away through the castle.

"Where are we going to?" Peter asked.

"The kitchens," Bilius answered.

"It was hard to make friends for me," Bilius was saying, "I had to earn it... So I became the guy who brings the snacks."

That's what Peter was.

And now Bilius was best mates with Derek Bell! 

There was hope.

There was hope, and Peter's heart thrilled because to him, James was his Derek Bell.

And there was Peter, carrying back bottles of pumpkin juice and butterbeer. Carrying back bags of food - of oranges and apples and cakes and warm bread and bags of sugared pecans and sandwiches and crisps and loads of good things that the boys all shared in the dormitory, sitting about talking and playing exploding snap or gobstones or just having a lark about the grounds of the castle. Toast for Nigel, bits of dried fish for Mrs. Norris when they were out exploring under the invisibility cloak, coaxing the cat to leave them be and not alert Filch of their where abouts....

Their whereabouts -- like the prefect's toilet in Slytherin.

And there was Voldemort grinning meanly at Peter in the dark. 

"Your friends left you, Peter Pettigrew..."

And that cold, terrible voice echoed through Peter.

"But I'm a Marauder, too," Peter was telling himself - not first year Peter but years later, one of the many times the boys had forgotten Peter and he was trying to decide whether he ought to catch them up or not. "I'm a Marauder, too. I should catch them up, I should - I - they'll miss me. Won't they? Will they?" Peter shivered.

"You're one of us, Pete," Sirius's voice echoed.

But he was afraid it was just words.

Because actions speak louder than words.

And there he was, sitting in the window of his house, staring out, rucksack packed and ready... but nobody coming to get him.

He knew where they were...

But if they didn't want him there, did he want to be there?

He did.

But did he?

Did it even matter?

And he lay in his bed in his room, and no matter how much he fought the emotions, they flooded him anyway.

You're not good enough.

You've never been good enough.

Always running to keep up.

"You need to keep up," McGonagall's words echoed and Pete was sitting in her office before her desk as she peered over her half moon glasses at him. "What is going on, Mr. Pettigrew? I can see in your grades something is bothering you." 

Peter looked up at McGonagall. "Did you have loads of friends in school, Professor?"

"I had a group of friends... rather a lot like the Marauders." She paused, then looked Peter over carefully. "Is something going on... between you and your friends, Mr. Pettigrew?"

Peter stared at the desk and shook his head.

"Peter?" she tried more gently.

He looked up at her. "They went camping this summer... and - we were all supposed to go but they - they forgot to come and get me, even though they said they would and --" Peter looked down at his trainers. "I don't want to force myself on them if - if they don't want me." He started crying.

McGonagall sighed and her lips pursed in a way that Sirius recognized as Minnie getting her Minnie on - switching from Professor McGonagall to the Minnie who wrote specialized make-up exams and held broken boy wolves. The Minnie who now stood up and came 'round the desk and knelt down before Peter, who was crying, and withdrew a handkerchief and wiped Peter's tears away gently - doing that thing that good mums like Dora Potter do when they wash your face to make you feel better and Peter stared into her face, hiccoughing. 

"I am verra sorry, Mr. Pettigrew..."

But them forgetting him didn't mean he would forget them.

He couldn't.

Because even though he was afraid and a couple steps behind, Peter came through when it mattered... didn't he?

He was the one who went to help James before anyone else did. When James was gone. Peter had thrown the stones and he'd gone -- he'd been tortured for James.

"Crucio!" Voldemort's voice - the spell striking Peter so that he hit the ground, the magic coursing through him, singing in every single nerve.

The crackling pain of the cruciatus flickered around the edges of the vision and Sirius gasped - he gasped at the way it hurt. And a sudden realization jarred him.

The cruciatus that Peter felt.... felt the same as the Marauders leaving Peter behind.

And they did it to him again and again and again.

"I'll never forget you Peter," the cold, raspy voice said.

And Sirius was looking up into the eyes of a man.

Professor Gaunt. Voldemort.

"I'll never forget you, Wormtail..." and Voldemort laughed a terrible, high laugh.

And there came Mopsus's clunking, shuffling gait - his milky eyes on Peter.

The golden glow of that unbreakable vow.

Clocks and watches spinning through Peter's mind.

A Mickey Mouse watch on the wrist of James Potter.

A slight of hand, a twist of fate...

Tears of anguish, of regret.

He'd never be one of them.

He was laying in the sewers, cold and alone, afraid - a train racing past the end of the drainpipe that he was calling home these days... shivering...

"And if you ever hurt one of my friends again," Sirius's voice rang, so completely honest and truthful that there was nothing to do but know that it was truth being spoken: "I'll fucking kill you."

And Peter had wondered:

Was it a promise?

If he was forced by Voldemort - if he did something he didn't want to do... didn't mean to do...

Would Sirius truly kill him?

So he wouldn't have to do it himself?

And if he asked him...

Would he do it preemptively?

The way Remus had made them promise to kill him if he ever attacked them?

"Sirius?" Peter asked one night in the dormitory, days before the battle at Fallengunder, those tremulous, terrifying days when they were waiting for the plan to fall in motion.

Peter had woken up, panting and panicked after he'd had a nightmare, one that felt too real, one where he stood with Voldemort in a dark street, the Dark Lord's laughter trembling all around Peter as he reached for a wooden gate that squeaked when it opened.

"What?" Sirius's voice was quiet. He was tucked under Remus's arm.

"Would you kill me?"

Sirius looked over, grey eyes black in the dim light. "What? Now?"

"No. If - if I did betray - betray one of you? Would you do it?" 

Sirius opened his mouth to answer, but Peter cut him off:

"Would you please do it?"

Sirius stared at him.

"In a heartbeat, Wormtail."

"Promise me."

"I promise."

The thought was so chilling that Sirius was jarred back from Peter, releasing his hand. He stared at Peter, in horror. 

Peter stared back, also in horror.

Peter shivered. "What the hell was that?" he asked, tears springing to his eyes. "What the hell was that? What did you just do to me?"

"I - I didn't --" Sirius stammered, his eyes wide with fear, feeling the panic in Peter fill himself up, feeling the anxiety and holy shit it was rather crippling.

He understood suddenly.

He understood so much he didn't think he ever could have understood.

"Oh gods Pete, you - you are one of us, though," Sirius said, and his eyes were damp with tears, "You are! And I - we never meant to forget you, Pete. We never meant to!" Sirius stood up and he went to hug Peter but Peter stood, too, and he scrambled 'round the chair, separating himself from Sirius, the upset coursing through him, the panic from the feeling he'd just had, reliving all that, seeing all that, knowing Sirius had seen it, too.

"D-don't - don't touch me! Please!" Peter begged.

"But Pete --" Sirius said.

"No, please!" Peter shook his head, "Please don't touch me, I - I don't like that. I don't like that feeling. Please. I - I ---"

"I'm sorry, Peter!" Sirius said. "I really am. You're one of my best friends and - I wouldn't want it to be you anymore than I'd want it to be Remus or James. I - I love you Pete, and I'm sorry I've been so hard on you, that I didn't understand. I'm sorry. I know you wouldn't hurt any of us - and I'd never kill you. When it came down to it I don't reckon I would have the guts to, no matter what you did to me."

Peter's face was pink with emotion and embarrassment. With fear.

"I'll do better," Sirius swore. "I'll be a better friend to you."

Peter's lip trembled and Sirius made a move to step 'round the chair - his aim to hug Peter - but Peter scrambled quickly to the door. "I have to go," he said. "I have to go."

He ran out of the house and down the walkway, fixed on getting to the disapparation point.

He couldn't explain why it upset him so much, why he didn't want Sirius to hug him, why he didn't want the apology or the pity. He just knew he didn't.

Maybe because he didn't deserve it, he thought. After all, what had he done to deserve it?

Lately, nothing. Lately, he'd stolen and cheated and lied so much that he didn't feel like he deserved to be Sirius's friend anymore. He didn't know why it felt like he'd done things that were irreversible. That made him not the same person as the little boy in the vision that Sirius had had of him - an incomplete summary - one that had been interrupted.

He didn't know why it felt too late.

But he did know that it was his own fault.

Wasn't it?

He was pushing open the gate at the street, shoving it to get out, rushing, and the hinge pulled and there was a quiet crack. It didn't break... but it started to.

That was the last time that gate opened without squeaking.

He disapparated even as Sirius came out the door onto the porch and called out, "Wormtail, I --"

Peter found himself in the alley by the flat in East London a moment later...  Surely Sirius would look for him here, though. So he ran 'round the front to the street, to the curry shop, and he burst into the front door, tears still hot on his cheeks, and Oni was sitting at one of the tables, eating a breakfast, doing some kind of paperwork for the restaurant, and she looked up in shock when Peter came running in.

"What's wrong? Peter?" she asked, worry etched on her face.

"We have to kill Voldemort," Peter choked out the words, "We have to do it. All the stuff we planned? It has to happen. We really have to do it for real or he's gonna kill us all. He's gonna kill every one of us and it'll be all my fault."

"Peter - what are you --"

"One by one everyone I love is gonna die," Peter sobbed, "And I don't want them to die. I don't want to die. I don't want my friends to die!"

Oni stood up and he rushed into her arms and sobbed against her shoulders. She wrapped her arms around him.

It was the hug he'd really needed from Sirius... but he hadn't dared to take.

Because he'd been afraid Sirius might see it all - might see him taking Regulus's portrait just like he'd taken James's watch. And it was hard enough knowing that Sirius would hate him forever without actually having to go through it actually happening.

"It's alright, Peter," Oni whispered as Peter shook in her arms