Title: Break

Author: Shannon/Raindrops on Roses

Rating: K+ (for language)
Category: General

Spoilers: Prisoner of Azkaban

Disclaimer: Not mine.

Author's Note: Written for challenge #10 at the cookienook LJ community.

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Someone is dreaming.

It's a happy dream, full of sunshine and laughter and bunnies and Chocolate Frogs. And the dreamer thinks, 'What the fuck?'

"Watch your language, young man!" an old woman scolds from her rocking chair.

"Er, sorry." The young man, who is not actually all that young, scowls. It's his dream. He should be allowed to use whatever language he wants.

He hasn't felt sunshine on his face in a long time. Seven years. It's been seven years since he's laughed with his friends (two dead, one a traitor, the last left alone in the world), ate an Acid Pop (he'd met James that way), trounced Slytherin at Quidditch (honestly, Snivellus as a Seeker was pathetic)--

The sun is gone.

It's not concealed by clouds. It's just... gone.

He smells the ozone of discharged spells. People are screaming, and he's surrounded by red, and Peter's gone, and he's laughing, he's laughing, and he's disarmed and Stunned--

The moon is full. There's a howl in the distance, high, keening, lonely. He stumbles toward the sound.

Teeth. Yellow, jagged, dripping with saliva. He bares his own teeth and growls, but it's no match for the wolf.

Bloodthirsty jaws snap at him, and he runs, fleeing through the forest.

He breaks into a clearing, and--

"Sirius Black, you are guilty of the murders of James Potter and Lily Evans Potter. You are hereby sentenced to life in Azkaban Prison."

"But I didn't do it! It was Peter! I'm--"

Dark eyes snap open. Whimpers die down. A large black dog curls up tightly inside a filthy, pitch-black cell. The dog shivers as the unnatural cold overtakes it. The man inside the dog huddles in a corner of his mind. Innocent. I'm innocent.

The thought brings him no hope.

End.