AN: Roughly 2 years later... :_) Hope you all enjoy, I'm sorry for the super long wait on this one!
As always, don't be afraid to review!
Much love,
Alex

"The Vanishing Room"

Sirius slumped down the stone wall, heaving breaths punctuated with near hysterical giggles, seemingly oblivious of the plight which the two boys had gotten themselves into. While Remus could hear Filch shrieking and feel the vibration of the man's fist on the wall, there was no door to be found, no openings of any kind. They simply seemed to have been sealed into the room, eaten up by Hogwarts as if they had never existed.

His breath started to quicken as he ran his hands over the wall over and over, desperate to find a crack of some kind, a hinge, that would make the situation make sense. Trick staircases and trick windows were one thing, but a vanishing room? Remus had never heard of anything like it, even being friends with Sirius and James, who each knew at least three different secret passageways around the castle already. Sucking in a deep breath and attempting to fight off the deep seated unease the wolf felt when it was trapped in a small space, he tore his attention away from where they had come in and began to take inventory of the room. It was quite small, perhaps the size of their dormitory (he thought longingly, imagining his warm bed amidst Gryffindor sheets, listening to Sirius's chatter). Sparsely furnished, with just a simple wooden table in the center, two rough-hewn chairs surrounding it.

Sirius seemed to be recovering from his hysterics enough to show interest in the little room- his big grey eyes gazed around with rapturous delight, no doubt imagining all the trouble he could get into now, by having this secret place as a new hiding spot.

"What do we do Sirius?" Remus whisper-shouted, too afraid of Filch maybe hearing them to raise his voice. He pulled at the worn cuffs of his sleeve as Sirius let out a bark of laughter.

"Rem, this is brilliant! I've never even heard of this place! Can you just think about the possibilities we have now? How many pranks we can think of that we never could have done before? I can't wait to tell James!" he whirled around as if to open the door to get out, but stopped dead in his tracks, turning to face Remus with a worried stare.

"Where's the door?"

"I don't know!" Remus squeaked, fighting the desire to wring his hands like he had seen his mother do when distressed. Now was not the time to panic- they had successfully evaded Flich, and as now victorious first years, they could not afford to get hung up on something like this. He forced himself to calm down, taking a deep breath and staring at the wall. Maybe he wasn't as brash as Sirius or James, but here was a way to prove himself to them. He would get himself and Sirius out of this mess.

"I can still hear Filch," Sirius said, pressing his ear to the wall. Of course he could still hear him- the man was cursing so loud that even human ears could hear him through the thick stone,

"Does he not know what this is either? I've never heard of this place before!" Sirius moved away from the wall, skipping to the two little chairs in the center of the room.

"Rem, this place is absolutely brilliant. Somewhere Filch can't get into? We can make this our headquarters! We can be the Allies, and Filch is the Axis Powers! There's even three of us! I have dibs on America- I've always thought that place is beyond brilliant! " he flung his arms out and spun in a circle, giddy with plans and prospective pranking.

Remus cursed himself for ever bothering to explain the second world war to Sirius.

"Sirius, we can't do anything if we can't get out of here!" his short retort stopped Sirius's gloating, and the other boy stared at Remus with wide, worried gray eyes.

Remus closed his eyes and began to concentrate, scrambling to remember and scrap of magic that would aid them in their plight. There was "Alohamora", a charm to open locks, but they were not dealing with a lock. They had learned "Wingardium Leviosa", but that would do them no good against a stone wall, and where even would the wall levitate to? Absently, he noticed that Flich's stream of curses and threats had ceased, and there was no other sound from the outside corridor. That began to worry Remus even more- that meant Filch had gone off to find Dumbledore, or another teacher, and Merlin only knew what kind of trouble he and Sirius could be in, no matter how unintentional their entrapment was.

'What we need is to find a hinge of some sort,' he thought, opening his eyes and feeling the cracks between the stones.

'We need a way out. If we can find a hinge or a lever, maybe we can pry the door open!'

Remus's concentration was broken by Sirius's cry of shock- right next to his hand, a set of brass hinges and an intricate little doorknob had appeared, all of which had not been there when he closed his eyes.

"Bloody hell…" Sirius whispered.

"This place must be enchanted," Remus murmured to himself, tentatively turning the doorknob, with Sirius breathing eagerly down his neck.

Cautiously, the two boys opened the door, only to find themselves thrust violently out of what appeared to be a broom closet. Remus sat up, dazed and disoriented, only to find what they had come out of was indeed a broom closet- the broom closet on the third floor next to McGonagall's room! Somehow, they had came out in an entirely different place then where they came in, and when Sirius opened the door to the closet, there was nothing inside it but brooms, a dustbin, and several sad looking sets of black school robes. There was no door inside the closet, nor any sign that the room they had just been in had ever existed.

Remus had never been more intrigued in his life- he had never even heard of a place that could just vanish like that!

He turned to Sirius, who was staring at him in absolutely delight.

"Rem, we HAVE to tell James about this!"

"I'm bored." Sirius slumped back over his bed, staring up at the ceiling. Remus glanced over at him over his Transfiguration homework, slight stirrings of annoyance beginning to bubble up inside in his stomach. All he wanted was one afternoon to accomplish some schoolwork- the full moon was only a few weeks away, and he hated having to do extra work because he had to transform. Sirius couldn't even give him that- the three of them had done absolutely nothing but search for the room for the past week, sneaking around after hours for the "Vanishing Room" as Sirius had begun to call it. Remus secretly thought a better name was called for. "Vanishing Room" simply just did not have enough ring to it. It made it sound like someplace one would go to practice for Charms work.

Nevertheless, Sirius's constant enthusiasm had been catching- at first. But after several awkward run-ins with professors, and one incredibly uncomfortable encounter involving two Slytherin fifth years (are bodies really supposed to be able to move like that?) the only thing the trio had come up with was severe metal scarring and several welts from Peeves throwing erasers.

The late October rain made it difficult to do anything at all; it thrashed at the castle walls, drenching the students who were unfortunate enough to have Care of Magical Creatures. He was dreading his upcoming transformation in this weather, with the extra aches and bones that would come with the damp air. Hagrid had invited him, as well as James and Sirius, down for tea yesterday morning, but Remus was afraid they would get swept away by the fierce wind howling through the grounds. If he looked out of the window from his bed, he could see even the Willow bending in the gale. The next transformation would be a misery, for he could feel the deep set pain in the base of his spine already.

"Maybe we should go look for the room again?" Sirius asked the air, looking hopefully up at James, who was busy trying to charm a piece of his hair to lay flat on his forehead. James groaned and Remus bit back a sigh. While amusing at some times, Sirius's one track mind could get on ones last nerve.

"Black, the next time you ask me about that bloody room, I'm going to hex your eyebrows off."

Remus chuckled at James's irritated retort, returning to his book once more. Although he would never say it to Sirius's face, he was beginning to feel the same way. He hadn't played a game of chess with the other boy since they had the unfortunate incident with Filch- all Sirius did was think about ways he could find the room, pranks involving the room, and complain about not being able to find the room. It was starting to grate at Remus's infinite amount of patience.

He turned the page, tuning out Sirius and James' idle bickering, and attempted to focus on the new chapter they were learning in transfiguration- attempting animal-to-object transformations. Transfiguration was really a lovely subject, possibly one of his favorite classes. The precision and concentration required appealed to his meticulous nature, and he truly enjoyed spending time with Professor McGonagall. Asides from Dumbledore, Madame Pomfery, and Hagrid, she was the only other person who knew of his affliction in the school. He found himself opening up to the slightly austere young woman, not unlike in the way he opened up to Madame Pomfrey or Sirius and James. It truly was a blessing to have other people to interact with besides your parents, especially a woman who was so intelligent and could share her vast wealth of knowledge with him. Often, the times she came to visit him in the hospital wing involved him listening to her describe intricate spellwork in rapture.

Remus's quiet thoughts were interrupted by a tremendous BANG- acid green smoke filled the air, billowing over to Remus's side of the dormitory from where James had been standing.

"James?" Sirius called out, coughing and waving the smoke away from his face. Remus groaned, settling down his book gently and uncurling his legs, standing up and attempting to seen in the gloom. James was bound to have done something stupid- they were too young to try using body modification charms, but no matter how many times Remus had warned James, his bespectacled friend wouldn't listen.

"James, are you alright?" he asked, narrowly avoiding veering right into his bedpost. While already accomplished with a wand, attempting to charm ones appearance was nasty spell work. He hoped James hadn't hurt himself too badly with this silly charm.

"Don't… Don't look!" he heard James squeak, quite undignified and out of character. Sirius had reached their friend and turned him around, and let out a quiet gasp. Remus's stomach plummeted to his feet- if Sirius hadn't immediately started making fun of James, it was a bad sign.

James's glasses were shattered, and where he had previously had had normal, if slightly raised, eyebrows was a rather impressive set of horns coming out of the sides of his skull, not unlike that of the mule deer Hagrid claimed lived in the Forbidden Forest. James' skinny neck was drooping with the weight of them, his hands fluttering around his face uselessly as if to cover the protrusions.

"Oi, nice rack," Sirius yelped, and burst out into laughter, doubling over and grasping onto the frame of James's bed for support, squeaking out illegible words of mirth.

Remus breathed a sigh of relief before smiling slightly- Madame Pomfrey could easily fix that. And he had to admit, it was quite amusing to see James like this.

"Don't just laugh at me, you wanker!" James squawked, grabbing for Sirius, who was too overcome with laughter to do anything but fall on the floor and continue giggling, looking up at James through streaming eyes.

"HELP ME YOU GITS! What's the matter with you two? Aren't you supposed to be my friends? FRIENDS DON'T LAUGH WHEN FRIENDS GET HORNS. THEY HELP THEM!" Remus rolled his eyes- it was just his luck that both of his friends were the most dramatic people he could ever have laid eyes on. But, since James was right- friends don't laugh when friends get horns- he grabbed his cloak from the end of his bed and fastened it around his shoulders, leaning down to pull Sirius up from the floor by his collar absentmindedly.

It was really quite funny to see James like this, for he had the immeasurable confidence that all young boys had, but it was mismatched with his gangly body. He carried himself with the aura of someone regal (and Remus knew it was almost true- the Potters were an incredibly old and noble wizarding family, whose name was as well known as that of the Blacks, but for positive reasons), but his knobby knees, crooked glasses, and wild hair- so wild he resembled a chrysanthemum most of the time- often caused people to not take him seriously.

As for now, it was another one of those times. Pink faced and frantic, James would not have looked out of place on Remus's old block for Halloween, where all the muggle children dressed up as ghosts and ghouls and zombies for a night of candy and scaring.

"Remus, Remus please! You have an in with Pomfrey- she's soft on you! HELP ME REM- I'M DOOMED TO LIVE THE LIFE OF A DEER FOREVER!"

Remus merely shook his head and linked his arm around James elbow, herding his friends out of their dormitory and down the stairwell, into the cozy Gryffindor common room, where a fire was blazing and the armchairs looked plush and inviting. He gazed longingly towards the sofa before shaking his head again- he was a man on a mission to save James from certain doom.

Sirius trotted along at his side, still hiccoughing in little giggles and snorts every time he glanced over to James. It couldn't help but make Remus smile- while James had screwed up majorly, it was a simple fix, and quite an amusing predicament.

James kept whimpering and staring up at his new appendages, fluttering his hands around them as if it would make them disappear. His distress only made Sirius laugh harder, barks of laughter echoing off the stone walls down the silent corridor. Remus's right ear twitched- he could hear two people approaching them from the east end of the corridor. His heart sunk when he saw fiery red hair. It was Lily Evans, James's new infatuation, along with none other but Severus Snape, trotting along next to Lily like an overeager puppy. His sallow face was actually stretched into a smile, throwing his head back and laughing at whatever Lily had said to him.

'He really doesn't look that bad when he smiles,' Remus thought to himself. He personally thought that smiles brought out the best in people, and made them look the best. Snape's young face was so often twisted in a scowl or a frown that Remus thought it was permanently etched there- for the two months they had been in Hogwarts, he had yet to see the Slytherin crack a smile.

James let out a squeak when he saw Lily, and attempted to hide behind the taller Sirius, bending his head and flattening his hair so Lily wouldn't see his antlers. Sirius's lip twisted into a sneer when the two other children approached them, and Remus's stomach rolled. They didn't need to have another run-in with Snape, especially after the whole potion incident. He still hadn't really forgiven himself for that- no one, not even Snape, deserved that utter humiliation.

Snape returned Sirius's sneer and Remus couldn't tell whose eyes held more hatred- Sirius's, or Snape's. Lily crossed her arms and frowned at Remus and his friends, stepping protectively in front of Snape.

"Looking a little greasy today Snivellus- shall I wash your hair for you?" Sirius whipped out his wand and twirled it around his fingers and Lily's frown deepened.

"Why do you need to be mean to him? We were minding our own business and not even talking to you- why are you such a bully Black?"

James turned away from the wall as Lily spoke, antlers forgotten, a mocking smile directed at Snape.

"I know he wasn't talking to us Lil, but he just has this way of being an irritating little toe rag, doesn't he Sirius?"

Snape laughed out loud when he saw James's antlers, a sharp sound that ended as soon as it had begun, for Sirius had hexed Snape. He clutched out his throat, but no sound came out. Sirius must have mastered a silencing charm, and as mad and upset with Sirius in that second as he was, Remus was very impressed- they weren't supposed to have covered those until February.

"Severus!" Lily shrieked, dropping her book onto the floor and turning to Snape, frantically attempting to help him. Snape's face was murderous, and he whipped out his wand as well, lunging into a dueling stance.

Before Snape or James could retort, Lily had thrust her way in between them, a vicious look on her pretty face.

"James Potter, you and your friends are just bullies. You've got no right picking on people just because they're different. Why can't you just leave him alone?"

With neither James nor Snape willing to cast a hex with Lily standing between them, Lily took advantage of their stillness to grab Snape's arm and run down the corridor with him, red hair flying behind her. Remus bent and picked up her discarded Charms book- she must have driopped it when Sirius cursed Snape.

Behind him, his two friends hi-fived and exchanged congratulatory victory whoops, as if they had just won a mahjor battler rather than get into a skirmish with a classmate. Remus felt sick- he didn't want to be thought of as a bully by anyone. His mother and father had raised him to always consider others feelings, and clearly, James and Sirius's parents had not had the same influence over their offspring.