Caged.

Author's note:
Warnings for this chapter: Masturbation, animal genitalia.
Review please!

THIS STORY STILL NEEDS A BETA! Help me? Please?

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Once again, Ron stood trembling in front of a door, trying to resist the urge to run as far as his legs carried him. Once again, he somehow managed to pull himself together and knocked.
For a while nothing happened, and Ron considered knocking again (or returning to Dumbledore) when finally, Snape opened the door.
“Well?” he said, when Ron didn’t offer an explanation for his appearance right away.
“Dumbledore sent me. I am supposed to talk to –“
“Shut up and come in,” Snape interrupted, not wanting to be overheard. When they were in the classroom, he said “Your dear pet is over there,” he pointed at the door that led to the stock of potion supplies and ingredients, which puzzled Ron. “Before you go in, however, you need to know about certain safety measures. The room is divided by iron bars that can be removed, but only if they are touched from both sides. So you can’t get to him and the other way round if one of you doesn’t want it. I strongly suggest you refrain from doing so. I will put a monitoring spell on you that gives me basic information about vital functions. If you are in danger or pain, I will know. If you’re done, leave and I will put him back into his cage. Do try not to cause any more trouble.”
Ron nodded, overwhelmed by Snape not insulting him and generally giving helpful advise. He did notice, though, that Snape seemed to hold himself back by sheer force of will and that he didn’t look at Ron.
“Ready? [insert spell here].”
Snape pivoted and walked into his office, leaving Ron flabbergasted and unaccountably nervous. He carefully approached the door Snape had pointed out and opened it. Behind was, as he’d guessed, the storeroom, but it had another door in it that Ron had never seen when having been here during classes. He took a deep breath and entered.
The room was very small – if he leant on the wall, he couldn’t be reached through the bars, but he was much too close to them and the man behind for comfort.
“So you came,” Pettigrew said softly. He was standing in the corner slightly hunched over with beard stubble in his face that hadn’t been there a week before. His voice wasn’t as squeaky and panicked, either, but still fairly high for a grown man.
“I did,” was all Ron trusted himself to say. This man was a stranger to him, and that he was once fond of the rat he could turn into didn’t make him seem more familiar. That he was a traitor and murderer made Ron hate him, and hate wouldn’t bring him far here, he knew. He therefore chose to stay silent and settled on the cold stone floor in the opposite corner.
“Why are you sitting on the ground?”
“Because I like it here,” Ron said.
“Why?”
“Because it’s so cozy.”
Sarcasm, Ron thought, makes it easy to talk without actually saying anything. So far, talking to Pettigrew was not harder than talking to some stranger in Hogsmeade he didn’t want to get to know. The problem with this strategy, though, was that it was unlikely to encourage Pettigrew to pour his heart out to him. Ron looked at the floor, trying to find a good way to start a conversation, but the older man beat him to it.
“Why are you here?”
Ron decided to answer truthfully.
“Dumbledore sent me to talk to you.”
“Then why don’t you talk?”
“Why me?”
“Don’t you have anything to say to me?”
“No. Perhaps you have.”
“No. Yes. I don’t know. What do you want to hear?”
“What do I … hell, I don’t know. The story of your life. A confession of all your evil deeds. How it was like working for You-Know-Who.”
Ron knew he’d said too much before Pettigrew’s face turned blank. But he really didn’t know what he should ask, and he was not used to hold his temper in check. He felt tremendously stupid, having to talk when what he really wanted was whipping that treacherous excuse for a man until he told him everything he – or Dumbledore – needed to know. He wondered if the monitoring spell would let Snape know when he removed the bars to beat Pettigrew up. Then again, he was not that musculous and couldn’t be sure he’d really win a fight. And even if Snape was a sadistic bastard, Ron had the feeling he wouldn’t permit violence to the extent Ron wished to exert it.
“Painful,” Pettigrew answered his last question.
Ron supposed it had been, as Voldemort was said to have been quite fond of punishment, which made it all the more incomprehensible how anybody could willingly serve him.
“That’s your own fault, you know.”
“Yes.”
Ron acknowledged Pettigrew really must have been scared to death when he first saw him. He didn’t try to deny what he’d done or justify it, this time, and he seemed to be waiting for Ron to condemn him. But, as Dumbledore told him, that wouldn’t do. Ron decided to change the subject.
“I actually have a question.” A slight raise of the head told him he was asked to ask it.
“Have you been expecting me? Today? Because what you said when I entered, it sounded like you knew I was going to come.”
“No. But Dumbledore sent everybody he could think of to me. It was only a matter of time ‘till you came. Or the other two, Harry and the girl. Honestly, I don’t know what he’s expecting. I won’t go to Azkaban if I can help it. How is he going to punish me? I only want it to be over, really.”
“One would think that being imprisoned in rat form was punishment.”
“Are you kidding? It’s wonderful. All I have to do is sleep and eat, and you’re there to look out for me. And it’s … safe. As if nothing could happen, as if there’s no evil in the world. I think and feel differently as an animal, everything’s easier and I don’t worry so much.”
“You sound like a junkie. Or a child.”
Pettigrew was silent, which unnerved Ron more than him talking.
“Speak to me,” he commanded.
“Why should I?” came the reply. Ron didn’t know what he’d done to anger Pettigrew, but he sure knew a reply to that.
“Because else I’ll tell Dumbledore you’re uncooperative and won’t take you back.”
The man swallowed.
“But I won’t listen to a thirteen-year-old lecturing me on growing up.”
“Fine. I’m out then.”
“No! Wait, I’m … what do you want me to talk about?”
Ron actually thought about it. Dumbledore didn’t give him very specific orders, and what did he want to know himself? He decided to ask him the same question as he’d asked Remus.
“How did you end up friends with the others? James, Sirius and Professor Lupin?”
“You know, that’s a long story.”
“I have time.” That, Ron reflected, was definitely true, as his friends would still be in lessons now and talking to Pettigrew was not remotely as complicated as he’d anticipated. Knowing he could always leave and never see him again was reassuring, too.
“Well, we weren’t friends from the start,” Pettigrew began.
“James and Sirius met on their first train ride, had a lot in common and were friends from the moment they were sorted into the same house. I was shy and afraid – I’ve never seen so many people at once before, and they were all way cooler than me. Also, I felt uncomfortable in Gryffindor – we were supposed to be the brave ones with a true heart, and I never was that. I had hoped for Ravenclaw, though Hufflepuff would have fitted my social needs much better. Remus was in a similar situation – he was silent and studious, but Gryffindors were a loud lot. He also was even shyer than me and afraid of being exposed to others, he never spoke aloud to a group, at first. James and Sirius were running around all the time, exploring the castle, harrassing the girls and making new friends. Remus studied, I was left out. That changed a bit over the course of the first year – Remus became more open, and James discovered him as a conversation partner and someone to help out with homework. When James and Sirius were roaming the castle at night, we stayed awake and talked, often until after midnight. I had a muggle aunt – Sirius picked on me for it until Remus and James put their feet down. Remus parents were friends with their muggle neighbours, but a lot of muggle customs I learned at home were new to him.”
“Hang on. Sirius bullied you for being a half-blood?”
“He did, and he didn’t put it so nicely, I assure you. Sirius’ family were blood purists who sent him a howler for being sorted into that ‘house of shame’. He tried to convince his parents he liked it there until he discovered it had to do with politics. His sparse comments on people’s heritage ended when James told him he won’t be friends with someone who can’t think for himself and that he had to decide who he wanted to be friends with.”
“Sounds fair.”
“Yeah, just that in saying that, James was the spitting image of his own family’s views and not at all thinking for himself. They were rowing for several weeks, in which James sometimes used me as an example to prove muggle-borns are not so bad at all. I was thrilled to be included. When Sirius finally came to terms with James on matters of blood purity, he accepted me as a worthy acquaintance. Remus was the only one who’d still spoken to Sirius in the weeks of their fight, as he’s always given people a chance to prove themselves. He never gives up on anyone. It makes him a good teacher, I guess, but it also made him vulnerable to our accusations of being the spy. We knew the Dark Lord was recruiting werewolfs, granting them freedom and status – Remus was the type who’d listen to everybody before picking a side, and they were afraid he’d chosen a society more tolerant of his kind over his friends and beliefs. Of course, he’d never done that. He’s true to his word, his choices and his friends. Whatever, by the end of first year, we were friends of some sort. They even wrote me over the holidays. We got closer every year, somehow. They took me and Remus with them when exploring the castle, and when I discovered the entrance to the kitchens, we even had a small party down there, just us four. That’s when we started calling ourselves the marauders, and it was the first time Remus had fun breaking rules. As we grew older, the pranks we played got dirtier, the trouble we got into got bigger and the places we’d go got more dangerous. We had long since perfected working as a team. When we had a goal, we achieved it. We got around most punishments. No ban on anything could hold us back. When we discovered what Remus was, none of us ever thought about rejecting him. We even helped covering up the regularity of his absences. The few people who really got suspicious and discovered he was missing every full moon were told not him, but his mother was a werewolf, and he wanted to be home for her change every full moon. After all, he had told anyone he was visiting his sick mother.”
“Wouldn’t that have scared people just as much?”
“It’s a difference to know you’re near a werewolf and to know someone who knows someone who is one. We only told this version of the story three people, and they didn’t spread it. When we graduated, only about ten people ‘knew’.”
They was a short silence, until Ron couldn’t hold back anymore.
“If all that was so great, why did you betray them, then?”
Pettigrew didn’t answer straight away. He pulled himself back more, Ron noted, as if trying to disappear into the walls. I’ve never actually seen someone wishing for the ground to swallow them. He must be really uncomfortable about this.
“It was great. I really love those years, the memories. I never wanted to believe such friendship could fail, but it did, eventually. It was horrible seeing it fall apart, growing separate. I had nowhere to turn to anymore after school, perhaps even sooner.”
“Why? What happened?”
“I don’t know. It happened individually, over some time, and seperately for each of them. James … we lost James to Lily in fifth year, I think, but he stopped to really care about our friendship when they married and had Harry. It was all about the baby and he didn’t grow tired of rubbing in my face it’s what everyone should have, and I got angry because it’s what I would never have.”
“Because no girl would have you?” Ron asked, nearly pitiful.
“No, you moron.” Peter shot him a dirty look. “Because I’m gay.”
Ron stared at him in silence.
“What?” Peter asked irritably.
“I … I don’t know anybody who’s gay.”
“False. You know no one who’s admitted to it. Anyway, I guess James didn’t even know what he was doing to me with all that ‘children are so wonderful’ stuff. Maybe they are. I’ll never know.”
“But I’ve heard there are magical ways –“
“To turn someone into a woman, yes. I’m gay, not transsexual, thank you very much. Also, the potion is more expensive than the Malfoy’s yearly bribe money, and the spell’s permanent.”
“Oh.”
They were silent for a while.
“And it’s not like it sounds pleasant, being female for nine months just to go through labour.”
“I suppose.”
Peter didn’t offer further thoughts on the matter, but didn’t change the subject either. Ron searched for things to say, when Peter suddenly spoke again, more squeaky than before.
“And also, you were right, earlier. No one would have me anyway. I’m ugly.”
At that, Ron had the urgent impulse to say “You’re not!” and to look at Peter, really look at him, and pay him all the compliments he would have needed so much as a boy his age. But before he could be tempted to give in to it, he got up, said, “So you are,” and left. Snape wasn’t in the classroom, and he hastily walked out/left the room without searching for him.
Only when he walked up the stairs did Ron realize he had not only failed to find out what made their friendship fail, but he also had no clue on You-know-who’s recruiting methods, or how to get Pettigrew to turn himself in. He was halfway [to the Gryffindor common room] when it struck him he should at least tell Dumbledore his visit had been fruitless. Classes were not over yet, anyway, so his friends would not be up in the tower yet. Better get it over with now, he thought. Dumbledore’s perhaps waiting for me already. Oh, and the monitoring spell – I guess Snape will know I’ve left. Does it have to be lifted or could the spell be canceled from the distance?
Ron was slighly creeped out by the knowledge Snape could be keeping track on him and headed to the headmaster’s office without further delay. Dumbledore would know what to do about that.

“Bwaak.”
Dumbledore was standing in his office with his back turned, sorting through some parchments on the desk, but turned around as Ron entered.
“Mr. Weasley. I’ve been expecting you. How did it go? You spent quite some time down there.”
Ron shuffled his feet a bit. This would not be easy.
“Yeah, well, he talked a lot.”
“Really? That’s great. What did he talk about?”
“About his school days. Nothing relevant, I think. I didn’t know if and how to pressure him, I’m sorry.”
He hoped he didn’t sound as pathetic to Dumbledore as he sounded to himself. He hadn’t really tried, after all. He’d just sat there and tried not to lose his temper, and all he got for that was blathering and Pettigrew coming out.
“No, my boy, that’s great news. You don’t have to be sorry at all.”
“But what now? What’s the point of this if it’s not helping Sirius?”
“There’s always use in getting to know your enemies. He seemed to have talked a lot, after all. Would you tell me what he said?”
“Well, about how he got friends with the others. How great it was, in school days. How it fell apart. Well, he didn’t finish his story, I’m afraid.”
“Why not?”
Ron blushed.
“Because I left. He … he confused me, and I can take only so much, he went on and on, how am I supposed to digest all that. And he wasn’t telling me anything interesting, either.”
“I see … will you consider listening to him again? He’s not talked so much to anybody else yet, and if his narration reaches the relevant times, perhaps you’ll find out more. Also, I would like to have a look at your conversation.”
Ron froze.
“You – recorded it?”
“No, no, my boy. I’d like to take a look at it via a pensieve.”
“Er, okay. But I don’t know how to use a pensieve. And, before I forget it, Snape put a monitoring spell on me. I don’t know if he lifted it.”
“That’s no problem. He’ll know by now you’ve left Pettigrew and will cancel the spell himself.”
“Could you check? I don’t appreciate the idea of him being able to keep track on all my movements.”
Ron was afraid he’d crossed a line with that, but Dumbledore merely smiled.
“Of course. Now, the pensieve – guide your wand to your temple and concentrate on the memory you want to extract. Now pull – gently, mind you – and tip your wand on the pensieve, that silver trail that is the memory should dissolve – exactly. Now, I’ll be able to view it. Would you mind waiting a moment?”
“Not at all,” Ron murmured as Dumbledore entered his memory without waiting for his reply. This is just strange. As if talking to one’s pet wasn’t weird enough, now I have headmasters exploring memories of mine that I removed myself from my own head, and I have to stand here with no clue what I actually talked about with that murdering piece of …whatever.

It took Dumbledore not long to view and return Ron’s memories. It only then occurred to Ron he hasn’t really been down there all that long. When the silver thing entered his mind again, he felt it was a short, but very intense time and he should have been more surprised Pettigrew was willing to spill his heart to him after barely five minutes.
“Good job, Mr. Weasley.”
Whatever Ron had expected, this wasn’t it.
“What do you mean, sir?”
Dumbledore beamed at him.
“He’ll tell you all you want. He wants to talk. He does it without hesitation, as long as asked by the right person. That’s more than I hoped for.”
“Sir, I didn’t do anything. Really, you saw it yourself. Why can’t he just confide in you, for example?”
“Ah, if only it was that easy. I was involved heavily in the war, and as his enemy, to make it worse. I also was his teacher and headmaster once. He betrayed me, too, when he changed sides. That he talks freely shows he wants to be understood, and there might be some guilt he wants to squash with justifying his actions. But that’s exactly what we need, him trying to explain. He seems to be truthful to you, he’s not made excuses, so far. And you did a lot, you kept your temper in check, and you encouraged him several time without pressure. You’re like family to him, and you’re still a child and therefore no danger. He trusts you, and that’s what I’m thanking you for.”
Ron was bewildered. “I never wanted him to trust me, except today, when you asked me to. And what’s the deal – oh! Do you mean I should talk to him again?”
“Why not? He hasn’t finished his tale, has he? How about tomorrow, after you got your exam results? Have a lemon drop.”
Ron was shocked into actually trying one, but found it unbearable sour.
“Yeah … why not.”
“Let Professor Snape know when you’ll have time, then. If you’ll excuse me now, I have a lot work to do.”
Ron left the office without goodbye. Good manners, it seemed, were reserved for better days. How could he have been so stupid as to subject himself to listening again to murderous ramblings?
Well, he didn’t sound too murderous, today. If Dumbledore thinks it’s useful, then I won’t complain.