"I'm Dead?!"

Twas the night before Christmas and all through the building everyone was trying to finish their work quickly so they could leave early and wouldn't get stuck in the evening rush hour. Broderick Bunny's (that less famous rabbit) fictional character agency service was always busy just before Christmas while the agents finished up the contracts for their clients so that their Christmas specials would be ready to go out the next day.

Arthur Miller only had a few things to wrap up before he could leave. He was looking forward to Christmas. This year he had even managed to get Samwise Gamgee, a client of his friend Edward, to sign a picture for his daughter. He couldn't wait to see the smile on her little face when she opened it.

A very heavy book landed with a loud bang in front of Arthur.

"I die?!"

Arthur rolled his eyes but didn't look up. He had been expecting a visit like this for months. He had been looking forward to it.

"Yes, Mr Black," he said. "You die. We thought you'd be all right with it."

"All right? All right! How can I be all right with it?! I die! Finito. Pop. Gazoolzle. How can she write me out the books? The movies? I was only in three! And I barely appeared in any of them." Sirius tapped the copy of 'Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix' now sitting on Arthur's desk. "This is an outrage."

Arthur looked up and smiled brightly. "Would you like a seat?"

"A seat? A seat! How can you be so calm about this?"

Arthur gave his client a pitying look. "Well it has been out since June."

Sirius was stunned to silence for a moment. Arthur allowed himself a little smile. He loved doing this. In fact he had been doing this since Sirius Black had become a client. He was slowly building up the pressure but at the same time being very careful not to tip him too far. He was trying to cause him some serious psychological damage. In fact it had been Arthur's idea to kill off Sirius in the first place.

"I'm not dead," Sirius protested. "I refuse to be dead."

"Oh good," said Arthur, turning his computer screen around to show Sirius the Internet page he was reading. "Here."

Sirius glared. "Why are you showing me the official web page of the Sirius isn't dead club?"

"Because it proves that the fans don't think you're dead. You might come back."

Sirius was fazed only for a moment. "Wh- B- Who cares what a load of ten-year-olds think?"

Arthur frowned. "You have to be at least thirteen to join."

"It's an outrage!" Sirius repeated, ignoring Arthur and sticking to his pre-planned rant. "Have you read the way I die? Lily Potter gets to die to save the life of her son. Cedric dies at the hands of the evil Lord Voldemort giving Harry terrible nightmares for the rest of his life. I fall through a curtain. It's not fair! I want to cause Harry some grievous mental damage!"

So do I, Arthur thought. Harry was his two o'clock.

"You know it's in your contract," said Arthur. "J.K.Rowling writes it all."

"I want you," Sirius demanded. "To get this JK woman on the phone, tell her to get a proper name and tell her I want a re-write. I'm not going to argue with you, Arthur."

"That's good," said Arthur, calmly in the face of the finger now waggling threateningly in his direction. "I wasn't going to argue with you either."

"I can get very nasty, you know."

"Oh yes, sir."

Confusion crossed Sirius' brow. "Are you saying I'm mean?"

"Oh no, sir. Were you?"

"No."

"Then neither of us were suggesting you are mean. Biscuit?"

Sirius was in such a state of shock he took the offered treat and had a bite out of it before he managed to recover.

"Why wasn't I even told?"

"You should have read the preview manuscript sent round to everyone. That way you could have complained properly and officially and had it changed way before the publishing date. That's what everyone else did. And that's why Hermione has clothes on when she throws herself at Harry at the beginning.

Sirius was in a permanent state of puzzlement. "I don't think I read that..."

"That's a good thing. You really don't want to know how you died in that copy..." Arthur glanced at his watch. "Well I'm afraid time's up, Mr Black." Arthur swept everything in to his bag and got up. "Thank you for your visit. See you next year." He reached the door. "You can let yourself out. Happy holidays."

He left. Sirius was left shocked still with his mouth opening and shutting like a goldfish. Arthur popped his head back in.

"Oh," he said. "Did you get that preview script for the 'Prisoner of Azkaban' movie?"

"Er... I don't think so."

"Jolly good. See you in June."