Chapter Text
November 6th, 1979
The past ten hours have been some of the best in Barty Crouch Jr.’s entire life. Nothing but playing his favorite game with some of his favorite people ever.
Crouched around a small table sit his friends Regulus, Dorcas, Evan, and Peter. The basement has started to get a stuffy atmosphere to it because of their dedication of no breaks through their beloved campaign. They are so dedicated they haven't even noticed that when they first started in the early light, they have now made it to the last light. Trust the Black's secluded basement to let them escape reality for a while.
Their game of choice: Dungeons and Dragons. A game like no other, D&D makes them feel like they could really be somebody. A mage, a wizard, an elf, a dwarf, a savior, a king, a ruler, or even a fool. They are a party of “Slytherins,” a name gotten by Regulus from his comic Salazar’s Deeds of Doom. Barty has spent days working on this campaign for his friends to enjoy, and by the looks of their enthusiasm levels, he has succeeded. Dorcas has been twisting her braids through her fingers in anticipation, Evan hasn't been able to look away, Peter has been giving non-stop dialogue concerning their missions, and even Regulus hasn't moved his gaze from the board for at least the past 2 hours.
To really enhance the atmosphere, Barty has gotten out of his seat, hiding behind his Dungeon Master barrier. Getting ready to throw the next attack upon his eager friends, Barty gathers up small figures that appear to look like pigs and plants them in his hand. Barty gathers up his best intense glare, and slowly raises himself above the folder to catch his friends attention. "Your party has been tracking across the seemingly open field for mere minutes before...what's that?" Barty takes a hand to his ear, "the sound of gentle hooves fill your ears-"
Peter takes it upon himself to give his input, "oh shit, if its the Hidebehind we are so fucking screwed—"
"Can you just shut up!" Dorcas directs to the blonde while furiously rocking herself in her chair from excitement.
Barty continues now raising himself higher from the table, "The tall grass begins to part itself in front of you..." Barty starts a slow walk around the table coming up behind his friends to show his enthusiasm, "and the faint snorts get louder, louder, and louder..."
"What is it!" Evan chirps rather loudly, overcome with his dedication to the game.
Now behind Evan, Barty reaches his free hand to the back of the chair to bring his eyes down to Evan's level. Slowly, Barty takes his other hand-the one with the figurines-and slowly raises it to hover over the top of the game board.
"I swear to fucking God if its the Hidebehind we are done for." Peter adds in, sitting beside Evan.
"It's not the Hidebehind, idiot," Regulus snaps from his seat across from Peter.
Passing his gaze to each one of his friends, Barty opens his fist and lets the three pigs scatter themselves on the table. "A herd of Nogtails flood your way, their pig-ish nature tricking your senses."
"Nogtails?" Regulus mumbles in confusion.
Dorcas, now seemingly more pleased, launches herself up from her previous posture and points her finger in Regulus's face to her left, "I knew it! What did I say!"
Regulus' previous scowl has only deepened itself due to Dorcas' battering.
Now returned to his seat at the head of the table, Barty reaches his hand back behind his Dungeon Master folder to grab another figurine. This time, the figure seems to resemble a human with beast-like features. "Wait, the sound of there hooves aren't the only thing making those sounds...boom...BOOM...BOOM!" Barty slaps the Beast figure on the center of the game board, just behind the Nogtails, "The HIDEBEHIND!"
"We are so fucking done for," Peter sighs, knowing he was right all along.
Barty looks across to Evan, sitting on the right side of the table, "Evan, it's your action."
"I-um-I don't know," the light leaves Evan's eyes as he gazes at the table. It hurt's Barty's heart to see him worry, even if its just about something as small as this. Evan has always been really sensitive about some things since they were kids. Barty likes to blame it on growing up in the foster system, but he's grown to realize that's just how Evan is. Barty has always been patient with him about it.
"Crucio him—" Dorcas adds.
"But I'd have to roll a twenty or higher!" Evan counters.
"Are you slow! Cast a vanishing spell then attack!" Peter directs to Dorcas. At the same time, Peter has grabbed onto Evan's arm, hoping to shake sense into him.
"Don't be an idiot, Crucio," Regulus adds from his seat.
"No! Protection!" Peter insists.
Barty is practically bubbling with happiness. His friends are so into his campaign. He would never want to be anywhere but here with the people he cares about most. So, Barty adds to the chaos, "the Hidebehind is growing weary, clearly trying to build up invisibility for its surprise attack. It's charging up, Evan, what is your move!"
"JUST CRUCIO HIM ALREADY!"
"NO! PROTECTION FIRST!"
"The Hidebehind has started his invisibility process!"
"CRUCIO!"
"PROTECTION!"
"The Hidebehind—"
Clearly overwhelmed, Evan yells, "CRUCIO!" and throws the dice across the board, causing them to fall to the floor.
The group quickly all gather out of there seats and drop to the floor to look for the dice. With mixed mutters of where is it? and I swear if its not a twenty... the group sticks to the floor, adamant about finding the die. They scatter toward the steps of the stairs, hoping to have more luck there.
Suddenly, with a loud bang, the basement door flies open and at the top stands Walburga Black. Mrs. Black, true to her name, has long black hair that curls into loose ringlets-something passed down to Regulus and Sirius-and deep blue eyes that could give death life. She had always had a strict nature, but underneath she's a gentle creature with a weeping heart. Barty admires her like his own mother because truly she's taken it upon herself to act as his true mother since adopting him into the Black household. Right now, Barty can see the fury in her eyes, which he knows is just there to try and cover up her worry. With a huff she retorts, "Barty, Regulus it's fifteen after, I know you are having fun, but I said nine o'clock."
Barty looks to Regulus, but he just huffs and ticks his head toward their mother as his way of saying you deal with her. Barty nods and travels his way up the stairs to his mother to try and sway her. When he reaches the top, the both of them move to the kitchen and shut the basement door. The second the door closes, Barty can hear their conversation start again,
"Is it a twenty?"
"I don't know!"
"Jeez, Pete, move your ass."
"At least I'm looking!"
Walburga ignores the loud chatter from downstairs and stares into Barty's eyes with reason, "Barty, It's a school night, and you know Evan's mom doesn't like him out late! You kids are just going to have to pick this up next weekend—"
"Next weekend! But Mom, that would completely throw us off. If we could just get fifteen more minutes—"
"Bartemius—" she mutters as she heads to the sink, looking to be doing dishes.
Barty replies from the kitchen counter, "but Mom! You know how long this campaign took me! I know I didn't expect it to take ten hours—“
Walburga turns around with a stare and worries in her words, "you've been playing down there for ten HOURS?"
From the kitchen table, Barty can hear Orion Black kicking off his shoes at the front door. Barty has never been close with Orion, neither has Sirius or Regulus. Orion has always just been there. Never parenting, just adding in a quip response here and there make it look like he's trying. How he managed to pull a woman like Walburga, Barty will never know.
Just to prove his point, Barty turns and questions Orion, "Dad, do you think me and Regulus should—"
"Whatever your mother says," Orion mumbles as he turns to the living room to sit in front of the TV for daily "couch potato" activities—a name thought up by Sirius.
"Well, if our friends can't stay, then James should have to leave, too!" Barty exclaims to Walburga and jumps down from his seat at the counter.
~~~
Even if Peter considers himself a D&D fanatic, he can't lie that sitting there for the past ten hours has killed him. His mom is seriously going to kill him.
Shoving his papers into his small backpack, he overhears Evan mutter to Dorcas, "does a thirteen count?"
Dorcas puts on her jacket and then turns to Evan, "as long as Barty didn't see it, who cares."
Peter looks back to his bag and notices the pizza box laying on an adjacent table. He remembers James dropping it off on his way up to Sirius' room. Opening up the box, he realizes that the box still has a couple slices left. There's no way his going to be able to fit two slices in, so he turns to his friends, "does anyone want the extra pizza?"
Already on their way up the stairs all three Slytherins say, "no!" with mixtures of gross and just throw it away in their statements.
He looks back to the box and decides it's just going to have to go back to where it came from. He quickly gathers up his things and dashes his way up the basement stairs, slipping past what he can see as a feud between Barty and Mrs. Black. After a while, Peter has to catch his breath on the second flight of stairs up to Sirius room. Today was not the best day to wear a flannel, Jacket, and his Beatles shirt. But he's dead set on a mission to see Sirius and James, so he powers through it.
Finally reaching Sirius' room, Peter pokes his head into the doorframe to find James' back to the door, laying across Sirius' bed and Sirius perked up against the headframe talking. "Here's the thing you know I don't actually date. I like to keep my options open, so going with Mary could really hit my numbers." He hears Sirius explain.
"Your numbers?" James jokes, "Jesus, Sirius, these are girls not stock." James chuckles and shakes his head.
Peter uses this as the opportunity to knock on the doorframe to finally get their focus. "Hey, do you guys want this pizza back? There's two slices left!" he waves the box in the air hoping to catch their full attention.
James turns his head to meet Peter's place in the door while Sirius gets up. Sirius struts over to the door, and Peter has hope of actually getting to talk to him today when--BAM! Sirius slammed the door in his face, and he can hear Sirius retort back to James, "God, that kid's weird. And you wonder why I prefer your house."
Peter backs from the door and begins his way back down the stairs.
So much for trying to be nice, I guess.
~~~
Barty shivers at the cold breeze of the fall night, wrapping his arms tighter around himself to shield off the cool. Walburga insisted he make sure his friends "get out the door safe." Whatever that means. So now he is standing in their garage watching Dorcas, Peter, and Evan climb onto their bikes for their journey home. From behind he can hear the shut of the door to the house and then James' familiar voice, "hey, isn't there supposed to be five of you?" Annoying voice more like it.
"Regulus said he was tired and hurried up to bed." Barty quips as James makes his way to his own bike down the driveway.
"Tired?" James responds, "I barely see the kid, what's his problem?"
"Why do you always call us kids when you're like a year older than us?" Dorcas poses to James who is now struggling to situate himself onto his bike.
"Whatever, weirdos, I'll see you around." And with that, James has started his journey down the block to his stupid gated community. Barty cannot even begin to describe the ways he loathes James Potter, but his rich boy lifestyle is definitely towards the top of his list.
"Sirius is a right priss, did I ever tell you that?" Peter retorts, now slowly making his way down the driveway on his bike.
"It's because he's got a massive ego thanks to the girls who practically gravitate toward him like zombies." Dorcas jokes, giving the boys her best zombie impression.
Barty hisses through his teeth to show his hate, "I'm telling you guys it's because of that massive douche James."
"Remember when they used to actually hangout with us? Remember when they used to actually be in the party!" Peter is very adamant on hanging out with James and Sirius, for what reason Barty has no clue.
"That was when we were eleven." Dorcas replies.
"So?"
"So that was like 3 years ago!" Dorcas exclaims, trying to knock sense into Peter.
Their bickering chatter eases out of Barty's mind as the two depart from Barty's place near the garage. Those two are almost always bickering, but somehow their friendship seems to be stronger than ever. Barty cares about the both of them deeply and has always made sure their cuts at one another never run too deep. Why he takes it upon himself to keep them in line, he doesn't know.
"The die was a thirteen."
"What—“ Barty turns to find Evan's small smile across his pale face.
"The die. I found it. It was a thirteen. I guess the Hidebehind got me." Evan looks up at Barty from his bike, speaking to him. Evan has always been shorter than Barty, so Barty has to look down in order to meet his eyes with Evan's brown ones.
Even just in the few seconds, Barty can feel himself calm. He's not sure why, but Evan has always made him feel a little more sure of himself, more protected in a way. Barty likes to cast it off as another thing of just being friends for so long--each other's first friend in fact.
"Oh, well I'll see you tomorrow," Barty comments as he watches Evan follow his friends down the street to their off to their own houses.
Now with a found sense of warmth in his stomach, Barty turns back to head inside. Before he can make it into the house, he notices the front lights of the garage flicker. Weird. Finally, Barty heads into the house, making sure to turn off the front lights before he goes. Even with the sudden flicker, Barty's found warmth keeps itself in the pit of his stomach.
He doesn't know it yet, but he won't feel that warmth for a while. A long while.