The Consequences of Being Legally Dead

THE CONSEQUENCES OF BEING LEGALLY DEAD

(And Then Coming Back to Life)

The practice of raising the dead was one often spoken of but rarely attempted. Such magic was so Dark that only the most evil and unhinged thought it would be a good idea, and even then they all failed miserably. Most wizards realized that the post-resurrection problems that could arise were probably more trouble than they were worth, and settled in to live the rest of their lives as quickly as possible so that they might join their deceased loved one in the hereafter.

Spontaneous Death Reversal was completely unheard of, at least until this cloudy day in mid-2004 when an eight-years-dead Sirius Black begins banging on the long-ago locked door of the old Department of Mysteries.

The door soon gives way underneath the surprisingly strong and determined shoulder of the aforementioned Sirius Black, and he runs out into the hall and up through the building, hurrying towards light and fresh air and Harry and Remus!

He runs so quickly - not bad for a recently undead guy - that the security of the Ministry fails to identify him, and quickly loses him in the streets of London. Oh well, it was just probably one of their own anyway, late for dinner.

Grimmauld Place is nowhere to be found. Woe. Sirius heads for the Leaky Cauldron, not really caring if he's identified. He spots a Muggle newsstand along the way and nearly dies (again) from shock to read the date. He is now hopelessly confused; the last thing he remembers is taunting his cousin and falling backwards. Perhaps she put some super-evil sort of Confundus hex on him?

Into the Leaky Cauldron he goes, and it's almost completely empty. He doesn't recognize the bartender, and the feeling seems mutual. The bartender is happy to give Sirius access to the Floo and the Network Map, though Sirius suspects such generosity is out of a desire to get the smelly man out of the way than any true helpfulness.

P for Potter . . . P . . . M, N, O . . . Patil . . . Parkinson . . . Podmore . . . Prewett, no too far . . . ahh, 'Potter, Harry J.: The Phoenix Nest, Godric's Hollow, Wales,' that's lovely.

He Floos.

No one is home.

Pictures on the wall stare at him in disbelief, and someone cries out in surprise and leaves the frame. He thinks it may have been Hermione.

The house is grand and sprawling, fitting given the inheritance Sirius knows was left to the boy from his parents. In fact, the house seems to be more of a commune, with sections divided by vastly different decorating tastes. Perhaps Harry brought his friends to continue living with him after Hogwarts.

Harry has left Hogwarts. It is an odd notion.

The date at the newsstand said it is early summer. A revelation: eight years to the day that Sirius can last recollect. What if . . . what if they thought he'd died that day? What if they're off remembering him today? Nice and egotistical, you snotty pureblood berk.

But it doesn't feel wrong.

Then from the room he Floo'd into comes a hysterical shout: "SIRIUS? SIRIUS!" The voice is mature and on the surface unrecognizable, but as it shouts his name he hears it crack with emotion and he knows that boyish sound anywhere.

"HARRY!"

There is a thunder of feet - Harry is not alone - and then a group of unexpectedly grown-up people are in the doorway to the room in which Sirius stands. Leading them all, still messy-haired and wearing glasses - though they are much more subtle than they were yesterday . . . er, eight years ago - is Harry Potter.

"Get the bloody fucking hell out of here . . ." mutters a voice in the silence, and Sirius recognizes an adult Ron Weasley, now equipped with an adult vocabulary.

Harry steps forward, his hand rising to cover his mouth, and shit but he is tall and broad and a fine young man and less the spitting image of James than Sirius would have guessed. He starts babbling, telling Sirius that he was dead, he'd fallen through the Veil and was dead, Remus said so and Remus wouldn't lie and he'd destroyed Grimmauld Place and please forgive him but Sirius you were DEAD!

Now Harry is crying, and Sirius can sense in the young man a reluctance to believe what he's seeing. Sirius wishes he had an explanation for his godson, a story to tell, a return to feel. But no, he just feels as though he's never left, and he's horribly confused.

Everyone starts talking at once now, and Sirius sees that Ron and Hermione and Ginny and . . . is that the Longbottom boy? There are a few other people, young men and women around Harry's age, but they all seem nervous and confused. Sirius knows how they feel.

The first to approach him is no-longer-little Ginny, her face pale and mature and wanting what she sees to be real. She reaches for him, slowly, pressing a cool hand to his cheek, and he lets out a held breath, as though despite his mind, his body recognizes how long it's been since he last had human contact. Ginny's knees buckle and she lets out sob, and Ron is there to catch her; now everyone is there and Harry's hugging Sirius so so so so tightly and Sirius hugs him back just as tightly and for a moment, everyone else fades away.

Then he realizes that everyone has gone silent and is looking back towards the entryway. Harry loosens his grip and gives Sirius a blinding smile - lord he's tall now, just as tall as me, he got that from Lily - then steps aside and Sirius can see what everyone is staring at.

Who everyone is staring at.

His heart skips a beat. It, too, seems to know more than his mind just how long he's been without companionship, as the sight of the man in the doorway makes him want to weep with joy at their reunion.

Moony stands there, looking rather well for a man whose eyes are screaming of a dead soul. Sirius doesn't like it, but he's just glad to know that Moony is still here, that he's taken care of Harry, that he didn't let the wolf take over, as many "experts" claimed would happen past the age of thirty-five.

"Pads . . ." Moony whispers, and the longing in his voice hurts like an arrow piercing the heart. Sirius would suggest the projectile was Cupid's, had Sirius not already been hit by him countless years ago. Not loving this man is an idea far more foreign than that of having been dead the last eight years.

Sirius feels like being a girl, so he takes the initiative and swoops over to a startled Remus Lupin, going so far as to actually pick him up and swing him around while hugging him desperately. After only a split second of surprise, Remus returns the embrace tenfold. Somewhere beyond this moment, actual girls are sniffling, as are a couple of the boys.

No overly-dramatic declarations of love, no sculpture-worthy kisses, but they don't need such things, anyway.

The two men separate, and Sirius announces that while he's really enjoying the attention, he feels as though he should probably bathe and get some new clothes, because who knows what kind of unhygienic filth being dead leaves behind?

The shower is divine.

Remus sits on the toilet seat in the shower-steamy room and tells Sirius everything that's been going on: Harry defeated Voldemort once and for all; Dumbledore is dead; most of the Order is dead; most of the Death Eaters are dead; a significant portion of Muggleborn wizards are dead. Sirius's name was cleared posthumously. Remus got to kill Bellatrix in revenge, while Pettigrew lives in a Dementorless Azkaban, his life spared after once again playing traitor and saving Harry's life. Harry lives a good life, mostly, Remus suspects, out of respect for his parents who after all died so that he may live. Harry has not been completely happy all these years, despite the fact that he grieved Sirius well and had long since accepted his death.

Remus admits he never stopped grieving.

It is a Saturday, so it's decided that Sirius's renewed state of life will be dealt with officially after the weekend, and that until then there is to be a party of massive proportions at the Nest. Surviving Order members are summoned, wizard caterers are hired for a rush job, and for two days no one does anything but eat and drink and make most merry. When night arrives, Sirius and Remus manage to sneak off to Remus's portion of the Nest - it is small and unassuming, sparsely furnished and possibly depressing in its emptiness - and confirm that Sirius is well and truly completely undead.

Sirius has not felt so alive since before James died.

Monday rolls around unwanted, as it is wont to do, and as several of the Nestlings head off for their jobs unhappily, Harry and Remus Floo back to the Ministry.

"Where do we go to reverse a death certificate?" is probably the strangest thing the main guard has ever heard in the five years he's worked there. The guard takes a wild guess: Magical Accidents and Catastrophes.

The assistant there is just as befuddled, and suggests going up another level to the Department of Magical Law Enforcement.

There they speak with someone who says that they'll need to discuss the situation. Leave contact information and they'll be in touch.

Back to the Nest they go, not really surprised at their lack of progress.

Dinner that evening is Sirius's favorite, and the men are loosening their trousers when it's gone, allowing the women to clean up. It's not sexist, Ron assures Sirius, who is taken aback by this apparently unprogressive attitude, it's just their turn.

They retire to the lounge shared by Harry's and Ron and Hermione's portions of the large house, where Hermione begins sharing a bit of research she'd done that day, trying to figure out just how Sirius returned to the land of the living. Most of them agree that it's more likely that the Veil did not lead to death, but no matter what, it only matters that Sirius is back with them all again.

As though scripted, that's when the MLE agents swoop in and quickly bind Sirius with magical cuffs and chains. There is much shouting and protestations - he'd been cleared by Fudge eight years ago! They have no right to arrest him! - but they insist the warrant is good and drag him away, literally kicking and screaming.

For a moment, Harry looks as though he might kill himself out of frustration. Then he Summons his robes and suggests anyone who plans to help get Sirius out join him, and Floos away.

Nymphadora Tonks is there, having anticipated their enraged arrival. She assures them that he wasn't dragged in on the old warrant from his escape from Azkaban, and quietly she admits that what they do have doesn't hold much water, and really comes from feeling completely unprepared for dealing with an undead man.

He's been arrested, she reveals, because he is legally dead.

And, therefore, illegally alive.

Remus lets out a single laugh in bemusement, and asks her to repeat that, because he's sure he's heard incorrectly.

Tonks repeats herself.

Remus still doesn't quite believe her, but assures her it's nothing personal.

They wait throughout the night on terribly uncomfortable chairs - it's sadistic, really, they are wizards - until Tonks tells them that Sirius will be put before the Wizengamot in an hour. Harry is not encouraged, never having lost the bad taste left in his mouth from his own disciplinary hearing nearly nine years previous.

Friends and family are allowed to witness these trials nowadays, and so they fill in the seats behind the slightly-less-evil-looking chair that Harry remembers all too well from his hearing. Sirius is brought in, and his eyes alight with joy when he sees them all there.

The court is brought to session, and the charge is read: indeed, Sirius has been arrested for being illegally alive.

As discussions begin, it becomes clear that Tonks was right, and this entire proceeding is merely based on utter confusion as to what to do with someone who shows up eight years after being declared dead. Even Muggles would have come to the same conclusion, one wizard points out. They will often declare a missing person dead without a body after a certain amount of time.

If Sirius wasn't dead, then where was he? And he must not have been dead, because nothing can resurrect the dead, everyone knows this.

No answers are forthcoming, and Sirius feels hope slipping away. For one lovely weekend he was free and happy and with his family. That's all he got. It's not fair.

Then, finally, an angel arrives. Penelope Clearwater speaks, reminding them all that neither Sirius's supposed death nor his apparent undeath were his fault. And they don't punish as harshly for crimes that are truly not the defendant's fault. Imprisonment would be too harsh a sentence for this charge.

The Wizengamot likes this idea. Perhaps a small fine and house arrest for a week, might that be enough?

That sounds reasonable, Penelope agrees. Along with the promise that the next time Sirius sees fit to die, he is to remain that way for eternity?

Heads are nodding, this solution pleases them. It is put to a vote: only one is against, and that witch would rather Sirius just go home and this whole proceeding was the stupidest thing she'd ever seen in her life and has the Wizengamot no heart?

The sentence is passed, and Sirius is asked to hand over five Knuts and to stay at the Nest and out of public areas until they can figure out how to spin his state of life to the press.

Sirius turns around in time to see Remus tossing him a Sickle, which Sirius happily places in Penelope's hand and tells her to keep the change.

Pleased to be done with it all, Sirius grabs Remus's hand, claps Harry on the shoulder, and leads everyone up to the Atrium. They all Floo back to the Nest, and finally, they all begin to live.

END.