Sirius woke up with a throbbing headache and a substantial crick in his neck. Sleepily, he rubbed the back of his head where the headache seemed to be originating and gazed up at his bedroom ceiling. Strangely enough, someone seemed to have snuck in during the night and replaced his ceiling with wooden planks, but sleep was still beckoning strongly enough that Sirius decided to ignore this little discrepancy in favour of rolling over and snuggling deep into his covers.

Almost immediately, he tumbled out of bed with a small "guh!" and a thin, stained sheet wrapped around his ankles. Sirius looked first at the floor and then at the ceiling – which, yes, was quite obviously not his ceiling when one looked at it properly – and then at the cot he'd just fallen out of. Missing memories filed into a neat line for inspection.

"Oh, goddamn!" Sirius swore loudly.

Promptly, with a little click, the door opened, and Potter's head popped in. "Ah! Mornin', sunshine."

Idly, Sirius wondered if it was possible to be threatening while sitting on the floor, having had your pants stolen at some unidentifiable point in time. Something told him probably not, but he decided to try anyway.

"You lot are so dead when–"

"– your father finds us," Potter finished cheerfully, stepping into the room and shutting the door. "Yes, I think everyone is quite clear on this concept."

Pirates shouldn't be able to use words like concept in full grammatically correct sentences, Sirius's brain wailed. Yes, his dignity replied, but see, currently, we aren't wearing pants.

"What happened to my clothes?"

"Confiscated!" caroled Potter, obviously enjoying himself far too much. "The captain says you can dress like the rest of us for as long as we've got the pleasure of your company."

"Your captain's a prick," Sirius pointed out.

And was that ever the wrong thing to say. Potter's face went from sunny to clouded in an instant, and his heavy eyebrows drew in and down into an angry furrow.

"I'll tell him you said so," Potter snapped reaching for the door handle, looking like he actually planned to do just that.

Something deep inside of Sirius began to scream in a tiny, watered-down voice. Possibly it was the long awaited sense of self-preservation, arriving just in time to keep Sirius's head on his shoulders. Or possibly not. Either way, it was enough to kick Sirius out of inertia. He made a desperate leap to stop the door, forgetting, for a moment, the sheet still twisted around his lower half. Only for a moment, however, because then the sheet pulled tight like a tourniquet, and Sirius found himself falling hard on the ground for a second time that morning.

"Look, shit," Sirius began, trying to look in control while tugging vainly on one end of the sheet. "Just wait a minute – fucking, come off! – I'll, I'll tell him myself, ok? If I can just – got it! – I can deal with him, alright?"

Potter looked quizzical. "Considering your present predicament, I'm not sure you could handle the captain."

With a frustrated growl, Sirius balled up the sheet and tossed it across the cabin then turned to Potter and shot off one of his better glares. "He doesn't scare me."

The look Potter gave him in return was indecipherable, caught somewhere between "not yet, at least" and "you're not very bright, are you?” Finally, he sighed and scratched at his temple.

"Well, looks like some luck is with you. The captain wanted me to bring you to him as soon as you came to. Get up."

"He's going to let me get dressed first, right?"

Potter snorted. "Yes, thank god."

Sirius looked at his bare knees and then at Potter. He looked at his bare toes and then at Potter. He looked at his bare...bits and then at Potter who was still standing in the doorway. Sirius grimaced.

"Can you turn around so I can at least pretend to change with dignity?"

"The captain said I was to escort you to his cabin," Potter said. "He didn't say anything about protecting you dignity." But he reached out and grabbed the door handle anyway, and with one more flashing grin, he disappeared again.

Alone again, rage, frustration, fury, and regret warred for precedence while Sirius himself flopped back against the floor and stared at the ceiling.

"Goddammit."

---

It took a while to find out which drawer contained which essential pieces of clothing, but eventually Sirius managed to scrape together something that vaguely resembled an outfit. Although he couldn't find any socks at all.

When he opened the door and took his first step into the greater Gryffindor, he found Potter leaning against the wall just outside the door, whistling one of the raunchier songs Sirius had learned in school.

That stupid manic grin flashed again, and Potter tilted his head to one side. "My, don't you clean up nice?"

"Sod off," growled Sirius, tugging on the left sleeve of his shirt, which irrationally fell a little short of his wrist even though the rest fit fine, and glowering at the world in general.

Potter, unsurprisingly, grinned again before swing around and heading off down the corridor. There was nothing else to be done, Sirius supposed, and fell into step a half pace behind.

They wound through what seemed like an unending maze of crisscrossing corridors, odd doors, and odder smells before they reached the stairs to the deck. Potter checked over his shoulder once before pushing the doors open.

Out in the fresh air, night was in full swing. A fog had settled, and the air was heavy with a salty, fishy smell. Sirius took a moment to wonder how long he had been unsconcious before the simple fact of ship took hold. Up this close, he had to admit, the Gryffindor was an impressive vessel. Thinner than the Ministry but more streamlined, slicker, and better cared for as well.

"Don't gawk, walk," Potter ordered, not pausing as he slid farther into the fog.

"Hey," Sirius barked, and he had to double step to catch up like Peter always did when Sirius was trying to avoid talking finances. Which raised the question... "Where's Peter?"

"Hm? Oh. Your friend," Potter made a waving gesture at the forecastle hidden somewhere in the fog behind them. "He's fitting in fine thanks to a little something I like to call humility."

Sirius ignored the barb and grunted. "Fitting in fine, hunh? What a traitor."

In only a few more paces, they reached what could only be the captain's cabin, and Sirius felt more than a little justified by the ornate woodwork. That, at least, was properly piratey, he decided as Potter knocked soundly. A muffled voice from inside replied, "Come."

The door was opened, and with a completely unnecessary shove, Potter ushered Sirius into the cabin. But rather than close the door immediately behind him, Potter stood in the doorway for a moment and gave Sirius an appraising little look.

"Want me to stay, Remus?" he asked eventually.

The captain looked up from the open book in his lap and smiled. "I think Mr. Black and I will manage on our own, don't you?" Sirius opened his mouth to interject, something terse and witty, no doubt, but he was cut off by the captain's quick, "Thank you, James," and Potter ducked his head in acknowledgment.

"Thank you, James?" Sirius asked when Potter had made his exit.

The captain smiled humourlessly. "You'll find, Black, when you've worked together as long as James Potter and I, formalities become very stupid, very fast."

Sirius, not entirely certain what to say to that, ignored it entirely, stuffed his hand in his pockets, and looked around.

The room was actually much smaller than its outsides suggested. But that probably had more to do with the complex bookshelves fixed to the walls, the books on the floor, and the books piled on every available, passing flat surface than with the actual architecture of the room.

"You realize," he said after the moment of silence had drawn on too long, "that someone's replaced your cabin with a library, right?"

Another infuriatingly indulgent smile passed across the captain's face, and he made a short gesture with one hand, closing his book and setting it on the ground with the other.

"Take a seat."

Even Sirius, who was beginning to suspect he knew very little about pirates, could translate that into order not invitation so wordlessly, he cleared a chair and pulled it round to sit on.

"I understand that you must be upset with your current situation," the captain began, threading his fingers together on the desktop beside an old copy of Don Quixote. "But it is likely for the best in the long–"

"My current situation?" Sirius boggled and then added, almost as an afterthought, "You kidnapped me!"

"I saved you from a sinking ship," the captain corrected levelly.

"You sank the ship!"

At this, the corner of the captain's mouth twitched once but otherwise, he hardly blinked, and certainly didn't show any signs of irony, when he said, "Hardly matters, don't you think?"

Sirius opened his mouth. He tried to say something – like yes, it did matter, as you bloody sank the bloody ship – but the only noises to come out were squeaky sounds of rage.

Oddly enough, the captain didn't take advantage of the momentary fit of silence. He just stared. Or perhaps 'regarded with something approaching interest' would be closer to the truth, and there was something in the cock of the head and the opaque intent of the eyes that cut through seething anger and made Sirius's newly recovered sense of self-preservation want to curl into a ball and hide.

"Look, uh, look," Sirius said, licking his lips nervously. "When my father finds you, there's going to be loads of trouble. Wouldn't it just be safer for everyone concerned if you dropped me off somewhere neutral and let me go on my way? Oh, and Peter too, I suppose."

"I"ve had trouble with the Lord Admiral before, and I am still here."

Sirius rolled his eyes as if the reason for that was self-evident. "Yeah, but you didn't kidnap his son last time, and trust me, threatening the continuation of the family line makes him a bit nutters."

The captain looked thoughtful, maybe verging on amused, cupping one hand underneath his chin and tapping his bottom lip with a lazy finger. "Indeed."

"Indeed," Sirius mimicked, irritation nudging what had probably, almost certainly, been a totally irrational bout of nervousness out of the picture. "Do you always talk like you've got a big stick shoved up your arse?"

The captain chuckled, a real chuckle even if it was so low that Sirius almost missed it, almost, on second thought, couldn't be certain it wasn't a product of his imagination.

"Having never had a big stick shoved up my arse," the captain replied, "I really wouldn't know."

Sirius glared. "You're an awful pirate," he said, just so all the cards were on the table.

"Probably," agreed the captain. "But I am a pirate, so perhaps you would be wise to listen to the deal I am offering."

"Fine. Talk."

"You'll come with us. You will, Black, until we see what use we can make of you. You will try not to complain or make life difficult for the rest of the crew. You will try hard. I'm sure James will find you something to occupy your time because you will work or you will not eat. Any questions?"

"Yeah, how–"

The captain interrupted with a sigh. "Sorry. I meant to say, any civil questions?"

Sirius slouched defiantly in his chair. "No," he replied, scowling and seriously contemplating the many ways one could commit murder with a beat-up Don Quixote.

"Good. You may go."

Sirius got up and kicked the chair to one side, making as much as noise as possible. The captain didn't flinch, and Sirius had the sudden maniacal urge to light his hair on fire and do some sort of pagan fertility dance around the cabin just to earn some reaction beyond blank nothingness.

With a frustrated growl, at himself, at the captain, at life in general, he spun and walked the two steps back to the door, only to be stopped just as he reached for the doorknob.

"Black, may I ask a question?"

Sirius turned and pressed his back against the wood. "What?"

The captain had his book open on his lap once more, but he placed a finger on the line he was reading and lifted his head to meet Sirius's eyes.

"Do you, by any chance, know a man named Regulus?"

"No, I don't," Sirius snapped and without waiting for official permission, turned, opened the door, and made very sure to slam it on his way out.

---

Sirius had been expecting to see Potter lounging outside the door, ready to rush to his precious captain's defense should the need arise – and Sirius thought it a great testament to his self-control that the need had not arisen – but instead, he found an older, red-haired man waiting for him.

"Sirius Black," the man declared at once, advancing with a warm smile that was perhaps the most terrifying thing Sirius had seen all day, "Arthur Weasley, good to meet you!"

He proffered a hand, and Sirius looked from the smiling, fatherly, distinctly unpiratey, face to the welcoming, clean-scrubbed, and once again unpiratey hand and back again before throwing his own hands up in the air.

"I really hate you all," he said to no one in particular.

Weasley, if anything, looked sort of hurt by this, but he rallied a sympathetic smile and nodded. "Hard times, hard times. I understand. I'm s'posed take you to the galley now, if you'd like."

Sirius shrugged expansively and, for the second time that day, headed off across the deck and into the depths of the Gryffindor. As they went, Weasley at least tried to make conversation, talking about the weather, the food, and some woman named Molly. Sirius only half-listened, instead devoting most of his brain functions to memorizing their path through the corridors.

Eventually, after Weasley halted for ten minutes to attack a fellow pirate with baby pictures, they arrived at a large door with a whittled sign reading, "GALLY." Sirius was quite pleased to see this appropriate misspelling until Weasley began ushering him inside, and his eyes caught the small inked E just above the L and the Y.

The galley wasn't as well lit as the captain's cabin, and it was crowded, dirty, and stinking. Somewhere over the din, Sirius heard a man's voice shout "yarr!" and for a moment, he was happier than he had been in hours. That is, until he spotted a small, familiar shape in the gloom, and irritation took hold again. He was halfway across the room before he even realized he was moving.

"Pettigrew! You rat!"

Peter, seated at one of the long tables, beside what looked like Potter – and really that was just insult to injury right there – jumped and twisted in his seat.

"S– S– Sirius! You're alright!"

"Alright, sure," Sirius growled, grabbing a solid fist of Peter's shirt and jerking the other man half to his feet. "Wotcher, Pete? You seem to be getting along just fine with your new friends. Waiting to see which way the wind will blow, eh? You little traitor."

Peter frantically squeaked out some pathetic excuses about guns and sabres and being quite attached to living before Potter intervened, casually prodding Sirius in the ribs with a fork.

"Leave him be, Black. Sit down, shut up, and eat something."

"Keep your nose out of it, Potter," Sirius snapped, but he let Peter go and shoved and bullied his way into a seat.

Peter settled back into his own seat and shot an awed, grateful look in Potter's direction. For his part, Potter just shrugged and took a gulp from his pint.

"Make yourself useful, Potter, and pass the potatoes," Sirius ordered when he was settled, and once the plate of sad baked potatoes had slid down his way, he tucked into dinner without bothering to say thank you.