Fic: Not Die Here in a Rage (Gen, PG)
Title: Not Die Here in a Rage
Author: La Onza
Characters: Scabbers!Peter, Crookshanks
Summary: The life of a pet suited Peter very well.
Rating: PG
A/N: originally conceived for one of the 30_hath daily prompts. I was looking over some of my Peter fics - I'm currently blocked on a new one - and decided that this one deserved some polishing up.
He had never liked change. The life of a pet suited him very well. For twelve years, change for him had consisted chiefly of moving from one comfortable place to another, and nothing more expected of him than to not chew on anything important. The Weasley family suited him very well. He passed easily through the long, freckled hands of one red-haired, wool-swathed, candy-smelling child after another, who, for all their noise and hurry and constant squabbling, were a marvelously predictable lot. Hogwarts suited him very well. It was a sleeping, dreaming, seemingly-immortal giant, and over the years he had learned to be no more pierced by the constant spectacle of youth and vitality than the stone walls were.
That life was now over.
He clung with three feet to the bed canopy, looking down at the pillow where he had once slept so comfortably. Now the very sight of it oppressed him. So many nights, lying awake and motionless, curled against Ron's neck, eyes open, listening, knowing that they could come at any moment. He had come to feel that he was living submerged in a medium thicker and colder than air. Liquid fear. Something had stirred and woken in him, and he had remembered that he knew this fear, and how to survive it. It could only drown you if you believed that there was something you could not bear to lose. Once you let go, the fear let go of you. And so he had made his plans.
He didn't have long to wait. The door that Seamus had not pulled completely to was nudged open, and the gingery tom stalked in with the exaggerated bandy-legged walk that emphasized the size of its testicles - no slinking for this cat. Instinctively he pressed his belly against the canopy, trying to make himself small, but the cat did not see him. It was only a bit smarter than the rest of its kind, and its attention was drawn by movement. Its eyes were fixed on the bed, where a small lump moved faintly beneath Ron's carelessly discarded pajamas.
It's going to work, he thought, and was surprised by the hard, fierce little joy the thought released.
The cat pounced onto the bed and raked away the pajamas with its claws. It stiffened and hissed with surprise as the chocolate frog leapt to its nose, not even seeing what had been beneath the frog until it was too late.
The yowls from below were astonishing, but he knew better than to stop to look. He sprang from the canopy to a rafter, scampered to the ceiling, and flattened himself to squeeze through a crevice into the wall. As he did so, he could hear the Fanged Frisbee disengage itself and fly off, growling with ill-temper. He knew it would take itself back to the twins' dorm, from whence he had laboriously dragged it after lulling it into a stupor with the smell of talcum powder, as James had once taught him to do.
No one knew all the hiding places Hogwarts held like he did. And with any luck, the ugly orange brute had left enough blood in the bed to incriminate itself. Word might get out that Ron's pet rat was dead. In a face-off between cat and rodent, no one would ever believe that the cat had been the victim. Maybe Hermione would finally be required to lock the vicious monster up.
The hard little joy still sat like a stone against his heart, and it occurred to him that it was wrong to say that he didn't like change, or rather, that it was only half the truth. It was as though, at some point in the distant past, his mind had split into two. Half of him indeed wanted only to doze and dream undisturbed. But the other half...ah, to seize the present moment and turn it in some unexpected way! To dive headlong into the river of change, where all was sink or swim, and ride a current to freedom...He had almost forgotten. But he could still do it.
Author: La Onza
Characters: Scabbers!Peter, Crookshanks
Summary: The life of a pet suited Peter very well.
Rating: PG
A/N: originally conceived for one of the 30_hath daily prompts. I was looking over some of my Peter fics - I'm currently blocked on a new one - and decided that this one deserved some polishing up.
He had never liked change. The life of a pet suited him very well. For twelve years, change for him had consisted chiefly of moving from one comfortable place to another, and nothing more expected of him than to not chew on anything important. The Weasley family suited him very well. He passed easily through the long, freckled hands of one red-haired, wool-swathed, candy-smelling child after another, who, for all their noise and hurry and constant squabbling, were a marvelously predictable lot. Hogwarts suited him very well. It was a sleeping, dreaming, seemingly-immortal giant, and over the years he had learned to be no more pierced by the constant spectacle of youth and vitality than the stone walls were.
That life was now over.
He clung with three feet to the bed canopy, looking down at the pillow where he had once slept so comfortably. Now the very sight of it oppressed him. So many nights, lying awake and motionless, curled against Ron's neck, eyes open, listening, knowing that they could come at any moment. He had come to feel that he was living submerged in a medium thicker and colder than air. Liquid fear. Something had stirred and woken in him, and he had remembered that he knew this fear, and how to survive it. It could only drown you if you believed that there was something you could not bear to lose. Once you let go, the fear let go of you. And so he had made his plans.
He didn't have long to wait. The door that Seamus had not pulled completely to was nudged open, and the gingery tom stalked in with the exaggerated bandy-legged walk that emphasized the size of its testicles - no slinking for this cat. Instinctively he pressed his belly against the canopy, trying to make himself small, but the cat did not see him. It was only a bit smarter than the rest of its kind, and its attention was drawn by movement. Its eyes were fixed on the bed, where a small lump moved faintly beneath Ron's carelessly discarded pajamas.
It's going to work, he thought, and was surprised by the hard, fierce little joy the thought released.
The cat pounced onto the bed and raked away the pajamas with its claws. It stiffened and hissed with surprise as the chocolate frog leapt to its nose, not even seeing what had been beneath the frog until it was too late.
The yowls from below were astonishing, but he knew better than to stop to look. He sprang from the canopy to a rafter, scampered to the ceiling, and flattened himself to squeeze through a crevice into the wall. As he did so, he could hear the Fanged Frisbee disengage itself and fly off, growling with ill-temper. He knew it would take itself back to the twins' dorm, from whence he had laboriously dragged it after lulling it into a stupor with the smell of talcum powder, as James had once taught him to do.
No one knew all the hiding places Hogwarts held like he did. And with any luck, the ugly orange brute had left enough blood in the bed to incriminate itself. Word might get out that Ron's pet rat was dead. In a face-off between cat and rodent, no one would ever believe that the cat had been the victim. Maybe Hermione would finally be required to lock the vicious monster up.
The hard little joy still sat like a stone against his heart, and it occurred to him that it was wrong to say that he didn't like change, or rather, that it was only half the truth. It was as though, at some point in the distant past, his mind had split into two. Half of him indeed wanted only to doze and dream undisturbed. But the other half...ah, to seize the present moment and turn it in some unexpected way! To dive headlong into the river of change, where all was sink or swim, and ride a current to freedom...He had almost forgotten. But he could still do it.