Gah, you're all too kind! My readers are too indescribably awesome for words! I must warn you all though that this is the last chapter and it's pretty anti-climatic. I think maybe some of you were expecting confrontation and all that, and now that I think about it that would be a better idea, but I've had this idea for this story in my head for so long that I can't bear not to write it the way I've envisioned it. So my humblest apologies and gratitude to those who take the time to read this chapter. I appreciate you all more than you'll ever know. :)

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Chapter 2: A Cage Is Needed To Know Freedom

"The most important things are the hardest things to say. They are the things you get ashamed of because words diminish your feelings - words shrink things that seem timeless when they are in your head to no more than living size when they are brought out."

~ Different Seasons – Stephen King

Sirius arrived back at his flat to find it empty.

No Remus. Not even the faint smell of his favourite tea that always wafted through their tiny flat when he was home. Usually, Sirius would have assumed that he was simply busy and hadn't come home yet, but after everything that McMahon had said, Sirius couldn't help but feel uneasy. He stood frozen in the doorway of their flat for a few moments after calling for Remus and hearing no answer. Fighting down the panic rising from deep in his gut, he left the flat and apparated to St Mungo's, where Remus worked as an intern Healer. He'd arrived by the wizarding entrance so it was crowded and he had to push past a few people in his haste, eliciting many grumbles and what sounded like a disgruntled bark from one unfortunate, misshapen man.

The Hospital was big – huge, in fact – and he knew that he couldn't find one particular Healer by himself, so he rushed to the front desk, behind which sat a young, pretty witch with the name 'Marlene' on her name tag. She looked up as Sirius approached, giving him the once-over as she obviously noted his good looks, almost unconsciously rearranging her shoulders to make her breasts more noticeable. Sirius ignored the action completely.

"I need to see Healer Remus Lupin", he said urgently, not bothering with niceties.

The woman called Marlene looked slightly put out by his obvious lack of interest in her but she still batted her eyelashes exaggeratedly as she replied, "I'll need your name and your business with him before I can give you that information, sir".

"Well that's none of your business, is it?" Sirius snapped, not having the patience for this Marlene when scenarios of McMahon hunting Remus down were running through his head, "Just tell me where he is. It's urgent".

Marlene's lips pursed at his rudeness and she quite abruptly stopped flirting.

"Then I'm afraid that this 'urgent business' will have to wait", she replied coolly in what appeared to be her most professional voice, "Please take a seat and wait patiently until Healer Lupin is available to speak with you".

Sirius opened his mouth to say something that would probably have him cursed rather nastily but luckily, someone spoke before he could.

"Sirius? Sirius Black?"

He closed his mouth and turned to see a wizard in blue Healer's robes with intern white trimming approaching him from behind the front desk, a look of pleasant surprise on his somewhat familiar face.

"It's me, Alastor Wrench, Remus' friend".

Sirius did remember him, he'd met him a couple of times when he'd come to see Remus at the Hospital; he and Remus were partnered in their internship and worked together. The man was friendly enough and he had an almost permanent, boyish smile, even when working with difficult patients.

"Are you here to see Remus?", Wrench asked knowingly, absently leaning on the back of Marlene's chair who looked rather annoyed now.

Sirius ignored her and turned his full attention to Wrench, "Where is he? It's urgent".

Wrench nodded agreeably, and pointed down the bench, "He's just down there, finishing some paperwork. Should be done in a minute or two".

Sirius followed where he was pointing and saw, there, right in front of his eyes, Remus at the very end of and behind the long bench, hunched over a long parchment, quill dancing across the paper. He waved a hurried thanks to Wrench who was being subjected to a nasty glare by Marlene, and took off down the long bench. Remus must have been deeply immersed in whatever he was doing as he didn't look up when Sirius approached, pausing only to skip a few inches of parchment and fill in some underlined spaces.

Relief flooded through Sirius as he reached him and he leaned heavily on his elbows on the bench next to Remus in sudden tiredness, the receding adrenalin leaving him weary and exhausted. This got Remus' attention and he glanced up, surprised to see Sirius standing before him.

"Sorry, I meant to get home on time but the last patient took longer than expected", he explained hurriedly. He paused and raised his eyebrow at Sirius slumped, tired posture, wildly messy Auror's robes, ruffled hair and finally, the bloody cut on his cheek.

"Is everything alright? Was it another fight?", he asked gently as he leaned over to inspect the cut.

Sirius flinched, knowing that Remus had meant only another fight with Voldemort supporters but it had brought back the memories of the short duel with his boss. However, he had never really intended to tell Remus about the fight so he only nodded that yes, it had been another fight, and held still while Remus took out his wand and expertly traced it over the cut, muttering a spell under his breath. With the cut professionally healed and cleaned, Remus brushed his thumb over where it used to be as if making sure it had healed properly, but his hand cupped Sirius' face a little longer than necessary and let Sirius know that he had truly concerned him. Sirius leaned into the touch slightly in silent reassurance that he was alright and, reassured, Remus' hand slipped from his face.

They both knew that public affection was dangerous for them. Remus' position as an intern was uncertain at best, because even though St Mungos claimed to be tolerant of werewolves as they needed their help in treating other werewolves, Remus was still treated rather badly. His fellow interns and the fully trained Healers knew nothing of his condition, but his superiors did and made sure that he was aware of what they thought of it. He was always given the worst, most punishing jobs that no other interns would take and was often made to work the longest hours, with the most difficult shifts and inhumane amounts of overtime. His bosses also made sure to always treat him with a condescending, repulsed attitude whenever they had to speak to him, as if he were a particularly stupid and disgusting creature, even though his recent practical and theoretical exam marks were among the highest of the interns.

But Remus endured it all with grace and dignity, Sirius mused as he watched as Remus gave him a tight smile and hastily returned to his paperwork, picking up the pace so Sirius wouldn't be waiting too long.

Sirius knew that Remus was immensely grateful for the job, even though he was treated terribly and it was unlikely that it would last much longer. They were both aware of the steadily increasing fear and hatred the wizarding world felt towards werewolves as the war went on and more of them joined Voldemort's ranks. They had both seen the articles in the Daily Prophet praising the Ministry's consideration of new laws to ban werewolves from working in jobs where they had interaction with humans. They had both seen the steadily worsening way that Remus was treated by his superiors and they both knew that his time at St Mungo's was running short. But it seemed that this only spurred Remus to work even harder, as if he wanted to make the most of the time he had working for the Hospital and as if he wanted to prove himself before he was tossed out. And Sirius knew that if Remus was aware that he had lost his own job, ultimately because of his relationship with him, Remus would never forgive himself. But he also knew that hiding something from him was nearly impossible.

Remus glanced up from beneath his eyelashes at Sirius, trying to discern the expression on Sirius' face as he watched him work. There was something amiss with Sirius today. It was in the way he watched him so intently, eyes roving over his face as if considering him deeply, as if Sirius was trying to commit everything about him to memory. It was unsettling to say the least. But Remus worked on, employing a concentrating expression, quite used to hiding his true feelings, even from Sirius. But Sirius, well Sirius was simply terrible at hiding things from him. His posture, expression and demeanour implied that something terrible had happened, something that he didn't want to him to know about but had shaken the man to his core enough to look at Remus as if he'd never seen him before, as if appreciating everything that he'd never had the mind or time to.

"You do know that you're terrible at hiding things, don't you Sirius?", he stated mildly, as if asking Sirius to pass the ink pot, even as he absently ticked a box on the parchment.

"Yes, you don't let me forget", Sirius admitted, smiling slightly at how well they knew each other.

Remus hummed distractedly, scratching down the details of the treatment he'd given his last patient for what felt like the hundredth time. It gave him time to think of how to approach what Sirius was trying and failing to hide from him.

"Was it a bad day at work?", he asked innocently, still not looking up.

"You could say that, but isn't it always?", Sirius replied evasively, thinking that he was starting to sound like Remus with his careful avoidance.

Then Remus lifted his head and looked Sirius straight in the eye, knowing that he could never refuse him or lie to him when he did so.

"You can talk to me about it, you know. You can tell me anything".

The look Sirius returned was deeply unsettling. It was a kind of tormented expression, as if Sirius was torn between saying something he wanted to say and saying something that he knew Remus wouldn't want to hear. But it seemed that the sincere, searching look that Remus had fixed him with wore him down.

"I had a fight with McMahon today. It got...ugly", Sirius admitted, defeated, unconsciously rubbing his cheek where he'd been cut as he continued, "That's where I got the cut and I'm pretty sure I destroyed half his office wall".

Remus' eyebrows shot up.

"You actually fought with him? And destroyed his wall?"

"Half his wall", Sirius corrected with a wry grin, trying not to look at Remus as he knew he could make him feel terrible about it, "But it was his own fault, he was the one who sent that curse in the first place, the mean bastard. I just blocked it and it exploded the wall instead".

He knew he'd said the wrong thing when Remus' face lost some of its colour and he didn't notice that he was dripping ink onto his parchment from where his quill hovered frozen over the paper.

"It wasn't too bad, mind you", he amended quickly, knowing that Remus was fighting the urge to drag him into a Healing room and give him a full check-up, "We only cast a couple of curses before the other Aurors came in and stopped us".

This didn't seem to be the correct response either as Remus dropped the quill and dropped his head to pinch the bridge of his nose as if trying to control an outburst.

"Why did you fight with him?", Remus groaned, his voice slightly muffled, "Why did you let him rile you up like that? I thought Aurors knew better than that".

Sirius knew that Remus was just worrying about him and that's why he'd said it, but the last remark made his already sensitized temper flare.

"Hey, what was I supposed to do?", he snapped back, completely forgetting to think about hiding the details from Remus, "Trust me, I wanted to kill the little shit for what he said about you, but I didn't, I didn't even hex him".

Remus' eyes narrowed but in more of a concerned, worrying way than threatening, and the expression made Sirius realise what he'd revealed.

"What did he say about me?"

Sirius shut his eyes tight and, leaning his elbows on the bench firmly, covered his face with his hands so he wouldn't have to look at the worried expression that ripped at his insides and made his inner Padfoot howl, furious with himself. He hadn't wanted to tell Remus about this, he hadn't wanted to see Remus blaming himself and the worry and guilt in those big, brown eyes. He'd meant to protect Remus from this but, as usual, his temper had gotten the better of him.

"Sirius, what did he say about me?", Remus asked again, firmer and more urgently this time.

Sirius knew that Remus obviously had some idea to what McMahon had said, because he was well aware of Remus' paranoia about people finding out about his lycanthropy. There was no point in trying to hide it from him now and besides, Sirius felt compelled to obey Remus when he used that voice.

He uncovered his face and looked down at the ink splatters on Remus' parchment, determined not to meet his gaze.

"He said that – that the Ministry frowned upon this sort of situation and he – he said some pretty nasty stuff about you and me...So I quit", he improvised lamely, not wanting to tell Remus all the things that McMahon had really said.

Remus was silent, that brooding sort of silent that never boded well for Sirius, and Sirius forced himself to look up at him, wanting him to say something – anything. Remus was looking down at his ink-stained hands, tawny hair hanging in front of his eyes and he looked so much smaller than Sirius remembered. The image was so starkly different to the Remus that Sirius knew; the witty, strong Remus that could flick an insult back with only a clever quip, the Remus that didn't let emotions show because he was determined not to let them get the better of him. But this Remus looked so defeated and heartbreakingly vulnerable that Sirius had to look away, hating himself for bringing Remus to this state.

"He knows what I am, then", Remus finally said softly, his voice betraying nothing – almost as if he were trying to block all feeling completely. Sirius didn't answer – there hadn't been a question, just a verbal confirmation of a terrible truth.

"I'm sorry", the guilt in Remus' voice made Sirius look at him sharply, feeling a stab of remorse as Remus lifted his head and the expression tore his heart apart.

"Sirius, I'm so sorry".

"Don't be", Sirius bit out harshly, needing to make Remus believe him, "It wasn't your fault, none of it is your fault. None of this is your fault".

He was barely aware that he had slammed his fists onto the bench in frustration, ignoring the people that gave him reproachful looks and focusing only on his anger, his anger at everything. The way Remus was treated by St Mungo's, by the Ministry, by everyone. Angry at what Remus had been forced to do, who he'd been forced to be, what he'd been forced to feel. And all for something that wasn't his fault. He was sick of it, sick of them all.

He looked directly at Remus to see him staring at him with a strange resignation on his face, as if he'd decided something.

"It is my fault. I didn't mean for it to happen but it's still my fault", he stated calmly, "You had to quit your job because of me, you've had to give up so many things because of me. You don't deserve..."

"Stop it", Sirius snapped, unable to take it when Remus talked about himself like that, "It's not your fault and I choose to give up these things. I chose you over my job because I know you're worth it. It doesn't matter what you or anybody else thinks about that – I know you're worth more than anything else and I don't regret it".

Remus shook his head and looked as if he were going to argue further but a loud, deep voice interrupted them.

"Lupin, what are you doing just standing around chatting? Get some work done!"

Remus' shoulders tensed and his face quickly changed back to polite and pleasant, covering the open emotions that had been displayed only moments before. Kendrick Powell, Remus' superior, strode down from behind the bench, glaring at the side of Remus' head as if he thought he could bore a hole into it. He reached them and, completely ignoring Sirius, peered down at the parchment that Remus had been working on and had accidentally splattered with ink.

"Why is this so messy? And why isn't it finished? I expected you to be done half an hour ago", he said in a quiet, low and dangerous voice, almost into Remus' ear as he hovered over his shoulder, "If you expect to be given special consideration for your disease then think again. Double shift tonight to make up for your absence next Thursday. And not a word of complaint or you can find someone else who will give you a job".

Sirius' lip curled in a snarl and he clenched his fists without realising it, wondering what in Merlin's name was happening today with people making him want to punch them. Remus however, looked straight ahead quite calmly and replied mildly, "Sir, I was promised tonight off".

Powell simply sneered in his ear, "I said double shift, Lupin. There are patients waiting and this", he snatched up the parchment and scrunched it up violently, "This will have to be done again due to an unacceptably low standard of work. I expected nothing more from your kind".

While Powell made a show of scrunching the up paper further in sadistic, exaggerated movements, a frown formed on Remus' brow and his eyes flickered to Sirius' face. His eyes took in the murderous expression, the shaking, clenched fists and his gaze slid over and fixed on where the cut had been on his cheek.

"You really believe that I'm worth it?", he asked quietly, eyes holding Sirius' earnestly, searching for truth.

Sirius stared right back and answered firmly without missing a beat, "You're worth it all".

Remus stared at him for another few minutes before jumping at Powell's voice, still dangerously quiet and brimming with anger.

"I said move it, Lupin. Or are you deaf as well as daft?"

Remus continued to hold Sirius' gaze for a few more seconds, his face setting as if making a decision before he turned to face Powell directly.

"I'm neither of those, Powell", he stated calmly, holding eye contact effortlessly, "And I will not move it. I was promised a night off tonight and I will get it. I deserve it more than anyone".

Powell's jaw visibly clenched as he glared back at Remus, his voice getting lower and quieter as he answered, "Unless you want to be unemployed, you will do as you're told and get to work, werewolf".

The last word was spat with such venom that Sirius felt the wild urge to pull Remus back as if he might be harmed by it. Remus didn't even flinch.

"If those are my only options then I think I would rather choose unemployment", Remus replied mildly, sending Sirius a meaningful glance as he said, "At least then I can choose self-respect; this job isn't worth that".

Powell glared at him, his right hand twitching as if longing to reach for his wand. But the moment passed and he simply smirked condescendingly at Remus.

"Self-respect? Animals have no use or need for self-respect. But by all means, Mr Lupin, continue to delude yourself".

"What the hell would you know about self-respect? You self-righteous prick", Sirius snarled, feeling himself tremble with rage "You treat others like shit and think you're all high and mighty when the people you order around are worth ten times more than you".

Powell turned to him, arching an eyebrow in surprise as if he'd only just realised he was there. But before he could give a retort, Remus had already placed a hand on the bench and used the leverage to push himself up and leap over the bench to land gracefully next to Sirius.

"Leave him, Sirius", he said softly, his hand tugging gently on Sirius' arm, "He's not worth it".

At those words, Sirius gave Powell one last glare before turning and storming away with Remus. He'd expected the man to shout after them, hex them or prevent them from leaving, but Powell did none of those things and Sirius did not look back. He followed Remus down the hall and out the front doors to Charmcorner Alley, a wizarding shopping and residential area. The sun had never seemed so bright before, the darkness of their day allowing them to fully appreciate warmth and light. They paused on the steps awhile, drinking in the fresh air and sunlight, unheeding of the hurrying, worried people pushing past them. They hadn't realised that they'd been craving freedom all this time when they hadn't even known that they were trapped.

Smiling the genuine, open smile that he reserved just for Sirius, Remus turned to him, their eyes communicating what words would undoubtedly cheapen. In answer, Sirius silently reached out his hand and they both ignored the disdainful, disapproving looks that they recieved when Remus took it, entwining their fingers together as they set off down the cold, stone steps into a war, together and free.

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Why is this fic so goddamn long? There isn't even that much in it! :/ Curse me and my inability to be brief and to-the-point when it comes to writing stories. Bah.

If any of you actually managed to make it through all of that anti-climatic writing, then I thank you so, so much. Please drop a review! I know my M-rated fics get more attention but I think my smutless stories would like some attention too. :)

My endless thanks to you all for just reading this goddamn thing! Even I was like, "Something fucking HAPPEN already!" XD

Meh.

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Please. :D