Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter. Some of the dialogue in this story is taken directly from the Harry Potter books; I don't own that either.

A/N: I am a cruel person. For some reason, I rejoice in the suffering of fictional characters. Case in point, the Marauders. I got the idea for this story while writing the next chapter of By The Light Of The Full Moon (I know, I'm sorry!) and for the past three days it hasn't left me alone. I think it came out fairly well in the end, but I'll leave that for you to decide.

Over and Over Again

i.

Remus is the first.

He is five years old and he has just had a nightmare. If he wants comfort, he should go to his mother, but he has always been an adventurous child: his parents can already see the Gryffindor in him. He pads out of the house on small feet, and out to the garden where the full moon's light glows bright.

Is it really his fault? Should he really be blamed for being curious?

He does not know, after all, that waiting in the shadows is a creature with yellow, yellow eyes and teeth as long as his arm. He does not know that his father made a dangerous mistake three days ago. He does not know, and that is all there is to it.

Of course, when he meets those yellow eyes and when those teeth sink into his shoulder, he knows something is wrong. He does not know just how drastically his life has changed; but then again, he's only a child.

Well – not anymore.

ii.

Sirius is next.

The child in him dies when he is eleven – six years after Remus, but still ridiculously early. It is the third day of school and he is talking to his fast-becoming best friend, James Potter, when the post arrives.

He cannot say he is not expecting the red envelope winging towards him, but perhaps he had held out a little bit of hope – maybe she would wait for a few days, at least. He is very still as the Howler explodes and his mother's voice, hysterical with rage, dominates the hall. He tries his best to ignore the insults being hurled at him and the members of his new house, even manages a smirk when she tells him what she thinks Gryffindors are fit for. It is the last sentence that pierces him.

"YOUR BROTHER IS A THOUSAND TIMES THE SON YOU ARE!"

She has thought it before, of course. But here it is: the final proof that Sirius's mother does not love him. No matter what he does, she will never love him.

"So," he says, turning to James with a grin, "what were you saying about that secret passage?"

iii.

The next death is Remus's, again.

He is lying in a hospital bed and his head is swimming, and James is speaking to him in a voice that is too kind and too gentle. James never talks like that.

"He told Snape how to get past the Willow, Moony."

Remus is too ill to say much, but his eyes widen and his heart stops. No, no, no, no, no. Sirius wouldn't do that – would he?

It is the absolute, unconditional trust in his friends that dies this time. Oh, he still trusts them – even Sirius, when he comes to forgive him – but there will always be a little seed of doubt, because if they have betrayed him once they can do it again, can't they?

iv.

Peter is next.

He dies in a dark room, watched by a circle of dark-robed people, as a dark mark is branded to his flesh. He screams; this death is not a quick one. Deaths in the presence of Lord Voldemort rarely are.

Once the burning is over and the angry red skin has cooled to black, he kneels before the Dark Lord and mutters words of loyalty. The Death Eaters cheer scornfully and he begins to relay some information on the next Order mission.

Peter the Marauder dies that night.

v.

James is the lucky one. He dies once.

He dies like a hero, facing wandless the greatest Dark Wizard of all time, and all the time he's thinking Lily, Harry, Lily, Harry, Lily, Harry. They have to have time to get away.

He falls lifeless in his own hallway, and the last thing he sees is a flash of light the colour of his wife's eyes. Sirius always used to joke that those eyes would kill him.

Voldemort steps over him as if he is a doormat, and makes his way up the stairs to kill James's wife and child. The Dark Lord murders him without so much as a second thought, but he faces him wandless because they have to have time to get away.

Later, people will call James a hero. They tend to forget that he is only twenty-one.

Maybe James isn't the lucky one, after all.

vi.

Sirius dies in the exact same spot that James does, as he drops to his knees in front of his best friend's body. Everything else is wiped from his mind, and all he can see is empty hazel eyes and ever so slightly lopsided glasses, and James is dead.

James is dead. And you have to wonder if Sirius will really live for the next fourteen years without him.

vii.

Peter dies with seven words, a flash of a knife and flick of a wand.

"Lily and James, Sirius! How could you?"

Sirius's eyes are wide as he comprehends what Peter is doing. He isn't fast enough to stop him, though, and Peter slices off his finger before making the street explode and transforming. He scurries away into the sewers, and the last thing he hears is Sirius's laugh.

It's funny, really, because he did it all so that he would live, and yet everything that makes him Peter Pettigrew dies that night.

viii.

Remus dies next, and it is quite possibly the first time that he has hated black-and-white fact.

There it is, simple and unarguable: Sirius Black in custody for the murder of Peter Pettigrew and twelve Muggles and the betrayal of James and Lily Potter. Somehow those little black forms on white paper hurt more than a werewolf's teeth ever could.

It will be a few hours before Dumbledore comes to him to give him more black-and-white answers – yes, James and Lily have been murdered; yes, Harry is alive; no, Peter will not have a funeral because all they found was a finger; yes, Sirius is to be imprisoned without trial; yes, he has asked to speak with Remus; yes, Remus's whole world has fallen apart by its seams and he's alone all over again.

He doesn't say that last one. But Remus thinks it.

Of course, Dumbledore left him to find out from the Prophet – there were things to do, after all, and since when have a werewolf's emotions ranked higher than the Order? Remus doesn't mind. At least, he tells himself he doesn't.

After a while the old Headmaster leaves, and Remus stares out of the window feeling like everything that keeps him together has died, and he has been left just an empty shell.

Of course, 'dead' doesn't even begin to cover it – he thinks the word 'shattered' might be more appropriate.

ix.

It is nearly thirteen years later that Remus dies again – but it can be doubted whether he really minds, this time.

His bones ache and he's fighting down a fever, and he knows there's something he's forgetting but he just doesn't care. He is bending over his desk and poring over an old piece of parchment that he knows only too well; and more specifically, at a little ink dot labelled in his own handwriting, Peter Pettigrew.

As he watches, Sirius Black leaps out, dragging Peter Pettigrew and Ronald Weasley into the tunnel under the Willow. Remus stares at it for a moment, all the puzzle pieces fitting together in his head, and the fragile protection he has built up against anything reminding him of before finally flickers and dies.

Remus runs. This time, he's getting the truth.

x.

Peter dies as he kneels before his old friends in their old hideout, and Remus tells old stories in a quiet, cutting little voice. He begs and snivels and pleads, because if there's one thing Peter fears it's dying.

He knows Sirius will show him no mercy, and so naturally he turns to Remus. Remus wouldn't kill him, would he? After all, he betrayed James and put Sirius in Azkaban, but he didn't hurt Remus.

But then he looks at Remus, really looks, sees the gnawing loneliness in his ex-friend's eyes, and realises that he hurt Remus as much as the other two. Perhaps more.

"Good-bye, Peter."

More than the words, it is the steely rage in Remus's tone that pierces Peter. It is the raw fury masking all the hurt and uncertainty and sorrow that gets him – and there is nothing he can do, after all, because Remus has every right to murder him.

It is the knowledge that in Remus's view he is worth nothing that kills Peter.

xi.

Sirius dies slowly.

It starts when he moves back into Grimmauld Place. When Harry arrives, his decline is temporarily halted, but then the children all go back to school and he freefalls.

Remus is there. Remus tries to save him. But Remus is broken as well, and as much as Sirius loves him he won't let Remus help him.

The cabin fever is unbearable and he's so jealous of the other Order members, because they can do something and he is trapped. He wastes away slowly, and the fire in him – the passion, the recklessness, the humour – it dies.

xii.

When Sirius does die, it's almost a relief, because he is in the thick of battle and finally he's free, and he can actually do something to help. And it is painless. A flash of red light and a fall backwards, and a brief feeling of coldness before nothing.

They can't hurt him now.

xiii.

Remus dies precisely forty-five seconds after Sirius.

Harry is screaming, calling, because he doesn't know. Remus wishes he were that innocent, that young. He wishes that he could scream, too. But he's the adult, after all.

He holds the boy tight, restraining him as he struggles. He has to be calm. He has to be the adult.

"There's nothing you can do, Harry… nothing… he's gone."

Speaking the words, acknowledging it, is what kills Remus this time.

xiv.

Peter is next.

He dies in another dark room, as a small circle of Death Eaters huddle around Bellatrix. She is relaying what happened at the Department of Mysteries, her eyes alight with storytelling fervour.

"You'll be pleased to hear this next part, Wormtail!" she calls. "Prick your little rat-ears up!"

Peter waits as she continues, voice growing ever more dramatic. "I took the Tonks girl down, too. The filthy little half-blood could very possibly be dead. And then… I had the pleasure of duelling Sirius Black – my dear cousin himself."

Peter sits frozen, waiting for someone to ask the question he cannot. At last, Goyle complies, and Bellatrix throws back her head and laughs. "Dead."

Dead. Dead. Sirius Black is dead. Padfoot is dead. The rational part of Peter is relieved – the man who wants him dead, gone – but still his heart contracts painfully and a few tears spring to his eyes.

The next moment he blinks them furiously away and goes back to hiding his emotions – hiding the fact that the casual words have killed him.

xv.

The next time Peter dies is in yet another dark room – a cellar, this time. He is murdering Harry, and at the same time he is screaming to himself to stop.

"You owe me, Wormtail!"

It is not the words that make him stop, but rather the fact that he is looking at Lily's eyes in James's face and all the old remorse comes flooding back tenfold. He releases the boy and a weight seems to lift from his shoulders: the payment of the life-debt.

But then his silver hand moves towards his throat, closes around it. The two boys try to save him, and if he could speak he would tell them to stop. All he can feel is a profound gladness: finally, what remains of his messed-up life is gone.

xvi.

Remus dies with the sunrise.

It is Bill Weasley's Patronus that gives him the news before dissolving into bright silver nothing. Remus stands in the middle of his kitchen and tries to pretend that nothing has changed – because Peter doesn't exist, hasn't existed for a long time.

Dora waddles in, her hand on her heavily pregnant stomach, and he greets her with a smile and a kiss. He has a new life now.

But still, the teenager in him that still hopes for the old days dies.

xvii.

Remus is the last.

He dies in the place he loves more than any other, fighting for a free world. His heart is screaming, screaming, because beside him his wife has fallen and she won't get up again.

He goes out in a blaze of colour and fury and blinding rage, and on the other side they are all waiting to welcome him: James, Sirius, Dora. In the last moments, however, his predominant feeling is the old, inescapable loneliness.

Because he always is the last one standing.

A/N: Please tell me what you thought in a review!

~Butterfly