BOOM.

"Aaaaaugh!" Remus heard a strangled yell from the other side of the train carriage. He looked up from his copy of Hogwarts, a History and gaped as two disheveled figures burst into his compartment and slammed the door shut behind them. They were covered in soot and very out-of-breath.

"That bastard singed off my eyebrow!" Said a tall, bony boy with hair that would made David Bowie jealous.

"They'll find us any second now!" said the other, a bespectacled boy holding a tattered rucksack.

"What's going on?" Remus asked them, wondering if he should fear for his life.

"You!" said the boy with glasses, pointing at Remus suddenly. Remus backed up a little, affronted. "We were never here! You saw nothing!"

Then he dove into his backpack and pulled out what looked like a purple, lacy blanket.

"Sirius, quick, climb into the luggage rack!" The boy with glasses said rapidly.

Remus watched, amazed, as the two of them curled in the luggage rack and promptly vanished into thin air.

"Gaaah... What?" Remus stuttered.

"Quiet! Act normal!" Said the luggage rack. Or, more accurately, the two invisible kids on it.

With barely time for him to think, the compartment door burst open once more. This time, two older kids appeared. One was a boy with long, flowing golden hair. The other was a woman who, quite frankly, reminded Remus of a banshee. Who was having a reeeally bad hair day.

"Where are they?" Screeched the woman. "I saw them come in here!"

"They're not here, Bellatrix. Let's try the next carriage." said the other.

Remus looked from one to the other. Their air was, quite frankly, dangerous. He wondered to himself, briefly, if he shouldn't just rat out the stowaways behind his trunk. After all, he didn't want to get on the bad side of the crazy-looking witch. Yes, it was the logical thing to do.

"Don't question me, Lucius!" Bellatrix snarled, pointing her wand at her friend's face. Lucius held up his hands, backing away a little.

Bellatrix turned her wand to Remus. "You know where they are..." She growled, stalking closer to him. "Answer me, you hair-brained twit!"

Remus's eyes widened and his heart hardened. To hell with logic. This girl was gonna get it.

"I don't know what you are talking about." Remus replied silkily.

Bellatrix took him by the tie and shoved him into the window. Remus's head cracked against the glass. He gasped, winded. He closed his eyes so he didn't have to look at the intense, unhinged eyes in front of him. He felt violated.

"You don't know what you're messing with." Bellatrix whispered in his ear. Remus grimaced. Her breath smelled horrid.

"I've seen nothing." Remus choked out.

Bellatrix let him go and staggered backwards. She seemed to be strangling the air and was breathing like she had run a marathon.

Okay, so she had a few screws loose. Nothing he couldn't deal with.

"Grrrrr!" She screeched, diving into the hallway and pulling a rotund, very frightened-looking little boy into the compartment. Remus realized what she was doing a second before she said it.

"Show me where they are, or fatso gets it!" She hissed with her wand pressed to the boy's temple. The boy squeaked like a mouse and started to tremble.

Don't look at the luggage rack... Don't look at the luggage rack... Remus chanted inwardly.

Too late.

"Ahaa!" she cried triumphantly and stood on the seat to feel about in the luggage rack.

Thinking quicker than he ever had in his life, Remus, behind his back, pointed his wand at his trunk, which was lying beside the two hiding children. The trunk burst open, flinging clothes, toiletries and books all over the compartment.

Bellatrix screamed, dancing about like the lunatic she was as she evaded flying pyjamas. Lucius yelped as he was hit in the head by A History of Magic, which, by the way, is a very heavy book indeed. Remus, cool as you please, apologized profusely about how full his trunk had been and oh my lord this train ride was bumpy, and that Lucius really should see the nurse about that bruise. While the two of them were still wondering what on earth had happened, Remus had shoved them out the door and locked it behind them.

He pressed his ear to the door and waited until the footsteps faded away, before he heaved a sigh of relief. He slumped against the door and sat heavily on the floor.

"They're gone." he called out the refugees above his head.

The next thirty seconds were filled with hysterical, breathless laughter as the two boys fell out of the luggage rack and onto the seats. They slapped each other on their backs and pulled Remus in for a hug. The stout little first-year, who had a look on his face reminiscent of a deer standing in front of an eighteen wheeler on a freeway, curled up on a seat and whimpered.

"That was brilliant!" Said Sirius, "You really put one on her, mate."

"That'll do." Remus chastised him, pushing them off. "I feel I'm owed an explanation."

The two boys looked a little guilty.

"Well, the psychotic bitch, see, is my cousin, Bellatrix." Sirius started off, "And Lucius is her friend. They're all in the wrong crowd, you know, obsessed with the whole pure-blood thing. Since I'm a relative, they kind of expect me to think the same way, you see."

"They tried to ambush him on the train." the other boy went on, "Convert him and all. They didn't like how he was hanging with me."

"James and I met on the platform." Sirius clarified.

"So, when they tried to get Sirius to sit with them, I told them all they were a mindless bunch of snivelling warthogs." James finished, gesturing proudly.

Remus gaped.

"Are you both really that stupid?" he snapped, "That lot is dangerous!"

"Oh, come on, they wouldn't hurt me." Sirius sniffed haughtily.

Remus huffed and shook his head sadly.

"You're lucky you ran into my compartment, you are." he sighed, pulling out a bottle of dittany from the wreckage that was his belongings strewn about on the seats. He smeared it on Sirius's eyebrow and on a scratch on James's cheek.

"So what's your name?" James asked.

"Remus Lupin." He replied absent-mindedly as he began to tidy up his things.

"Well, Remus Lupin," James went on, "I believe we are in your debt."

"Don't hold me to it. That lot deserves it." Remus remarked.

"Damn straight." Sirius grumbled, having found a package of chocolate frogs in Remus's bag and was helping himself.

James noticed the fourth person in the room and gently pushed his shoulder. "Hey, you all right?"

The little boy nodded weakly.

"What's your name?" Remus asked him as he charmed his books into a pile.

"P-Peter."

"Sorry you had to get involved in that." James said.

"It's all right." Peter replied, his voice still shaking like jello on a washing machine.

"Have a sweet." Sirius offered. Peter stuffed the chocolate into his mouth faster than Remus would've thought possible. James and Sirius stared at him openly.

Remus felt like he should break the awkward silence that had fallen over the four of them. "So James," He said, folding his trousers, "How did you come across an invisibility cloak?"

James went a little red and laughed nervously. "Yeah, about that... I'd appreciate it if you all didn't tell anyone. It's kind of special to me."

"Don't worry about it, I know how to keep mum." Sirius assured him.

"Like you said, I saw nothing." Remus grinned, feeling... What was the word? Mischievous.

And that was how the Marauders came to be.