Albus Dumbledore paced around his office for three hours and forty minutes after the feast ended.
Pacing usually helped; it gave rhythm to the thoughts swirling around in one's head, created a steady beat to focus on. Tonight, however, it wasn't having an iota of an effect.
Eventually, he span around and strode to the penseive. Gazing down at it, Dumebldore hesitate for a second.
Did he really want to relive this again?
Yes, he did.
He must.
His nose had barely skimmed the edges of the basin before he was floating down, further and further, until-

It was 3:32AM of the 27th of September, and Albus Dumbledore could not sleep. Something was wrong, he knew that much, but he had no idea what it was that was niggling at his mind. Part of having something off a sixth sense for tragedy was never knowing exactly what the tragedy would entail.
It was irritating to say in the least.
The door of the office slammed open. Dumbledore blamed his distracted mind for not knowing that somebody had been trying to get in, but here he was- the Head Boy, Gideon Prewitt- and his normally cheeky face was ashen, hands trembling.
"Fire," he gasped.

Dumbledore reached the scene of the crime in mere moments. His mind, usually so well held together, was in total disarray. Worry- what if somebody was hurt? Fury- Hogwarts was guarded against all but the darkest of fires, the ones only a truly evil being could conjure. Fear- this meant that there was somebody in the castle who was cunning enough to not only escape his notice, but launch an attack on the school.
He wasn't prepared for what he saw when he reached the West Tower. The door to the spiral staircase at the end of the wide hallway was completely obscured by dark smoke. The flames that reached out were moving fast, crawling over the stone walls and floor like a thick liquid, oranges, greens, purples and reds mixing together to form the most putrid shade he had ever seen.
His wand was out, counter-curses escaping his lips in seconds, though he knew it would have no effect. There was a ringing in his ears- and then he realized that it wasn't his ears. It was the flames.
A group of teachers appeared beside him, screaming and choking, waving wands and stumbling in all directions. It was unbeatable. It was deadly. It was going to kill them all.
Dumbledore turned to roar the one thing he had hoped never to say- 'evacuate the castle'- when the shrieks of the fire were interrupted by something much, much worse.

The scream of a student.

Everybody froze. The remaining calm that Dumbledore had been clinging on to slipped away as he stared into the flames and saw the vague outline of a person. The tendrils moved and writhed, glimpses of whoever it was becoming visible. A flash of pale skin, dark robes, red hair.
The girl screamed again, but Dumbledore knew who it was, and he couldn't hear. Panic had engulfed his senses. Everything was played out in silent slow motion. He didn't understand what happened next until after it had happened.
A gap appeared in the flames. An impossible gap, because no force could penetrate this level of dark magic.
A silhouette appeared in the gap, stumbled forwards, fell to its knees, looked up, passed out. Remus Lupin.
Another shadow fell forwards, and it was more students, more children, falling to the floor, out cold. Peter Pettigrew and Marlene McKinnon.
Nobody could move now, nobody could function. They could only watch as the girl who's scream thy had heard half- ran, half- fell out of the fire. She was still screaming, but it was words now, words that made no sense- and would make no sense, even months later. There was body hanging from her, supported by her, and he was screaming too, but it wasn't words. It wasn't fear. It was pain. Lily Evans stumbled and Sirius Black fell to the floor, landed on his back, arched towards the ceiling, wordless agony falling from him in a howl of pain that would haunt Dumbledore forever.
And the fire closed- but not before one more student walked through. He moved past his friends, barely sparing them a glance, eyes on Dumbledore's, face blank and almost unrecognizable through the dust and dirt. He came to an abrupt halt a few feet away, held out his arms. A second year girl was encased in them. She was unconscious. He looked close to it.
"I think that's everybody," James said quietly, barely heard over the sound of the dying flames, "But I couldn't see. I'm sorry."
And the he, too, lost the fight against gravity and hit the floor with a thud.

Dumbledore stood back from the pensieve and instantly resumed his pacing. It hadn't cleared any of his questions up, of course. He had watched this memory so much he had everything- from the colour of Marlene's shirt to the way Sirius whimpered exactly four times before his eyes flickered closed- and yet the night was as confusing to him as it had ever been. All Lily had been able to say, the last time he saw her, was 'They took it back. can't find it, they took it. They took him, they took it away.' She never explained what had been taken, or who had taken it. Sirius had been shell- shocked, completely mute. n fact, Dumbledore had no idea whether or not the boy had started speaking again. Marlene, Peter and Remus had been adamant that it wasn't them, that they didn't do it- but when asked to elaborate on the night, all three fell silent. And then there was James. James, who had rescued the Second Year, but refused to see her again. James, who had ignored his own injuries- of which there were many- in favor of sneaking from his room to each of his friends', where he would hold their hands and whisper to them with stormy eyes. James, who, when attending a meeting with several teachers, his parents and two Ministry officials, had launched himself at Dumbledore and held a previously concealed shard of glass to the old ma's throat.
"Don't doubt for a second that I could do it," he had whispered, and the look in his eyes was so soulless that Dumbledore had decided, right there and then, that they were guilty. There was even the fact that it had been set near the staffroom, which had contained Professor Gaskell- the Sixth Year Pastoral Carer- who James had threatened at wand point just a week earlier.
Dumbledore didn't know why that incident had occurred. He found he didn't want to, and Gaskell had continued at the school, never failing to show his hatred of the group whenever they were brought up in the teachers' conversations.

Sighing, Albus collapsed into his chair, steepling his fingers and resting his chin on them.
It would be so easy to insist that they were guilty.
But there was a chance that they weren't.

Regulus Black tip- toed down the hallway with a feeling in his gut that he only usually felt after waking up from a nightmare about his brother.

It was a small corridor that he was creeping down. The door to it was behind the staff table. Whoever organized it had obviously been half-asleep that day- the door was in the corner of the hall, on the opposite side than the new table. The new table, of course, was mere feet away from Regulus. He had felt eyes on him all through dinner.

The hallway was lit with the same flame brackets on stone wall as the rest of the school- and then he turned the corner and it wasn't.

Long, fluorescent lights, like the ones in St Mungos, were clipped to the white-washed ceiling. The floor was carpeted and the walls, Regulus found on further inspection, were strangely soft. He wondered why for a moment, and then realized, and felt sick. These were the walls used in asylums, to prevent injury when a crazy person flew at them.

He turned another corner and blinked. There were doors with numbers on, and names under the numbers. At the end of the hall was a long window. A woman and a man sat behind it, staring out into the hall. Regulus crept back slightly.
A hand came down on his shoulder. Regulus whirled around, heart in his throat and wand in the air. The girl snatched it from him and hid it behind her back.
"You shouldn't be here."
Her eyes were breathtaking. Regulus couldn't breathe
"Get out."
It was the olive- skinned girl from Group A. She scowled at him and took a step forward. He stumbled back, nearly falling into plain view of the adults behind the glass.
"But-"
"Listen to me, you little spaz. You're going to turn around and leave, right now, and if they catch you and he gets in trouble for it, I will hurt you. Understand? Now go."

Regulus was nearly at the Slytherin common room when he realized that she still had his wand.

He didn't go back or it.