Double Dog Dare! -- Episode 16
Mona, 6 February 2002

Black wasn't sure how long she'd been gone. 3 minutes... 3 hours... 3 days... the combination of physical and mental tortures he'd undergone had made his grasp on time wispy and inconsequential. No matter; there would never be enough time in the world for him to fully wallow in the despair that coursed through his veins with each treacherous heartbeat.

The fear was incapacitating. Gods, anything to not have to see that again.

Twelve years he had survived in Azkaban. Twelve years he had retained his humanity and shielded his mind from the decay and horror that surrounded him. Twelve years... and in one moment that bitch had undone it all, had brought all of that fear inside. And now he could no longer even trust the one person who had never once failed him, never once betrayed him... himself.

Fool! Of course he knew now that what she had shown him was only one possible outcome, one possible future. But the experience had been so real that he knew if he was forced to live it again, he would be helpless to do anything but curl in a ball and weep like a child.

Great help I am to our side, he thought bitterly. I get myself captured, let the map slip through my fingers, and have now been reduced to a pathetic, whimpering shell of a man.

And then a small point of light - of hope? - appeared to him in the depths of his haze of pain and self-loathing. Of course... she didn't know. Janet's control over him as a human might be absolute; but maybe - just as the Dementors were never able to get a handle on his canine psyche - the effects of the potion would be more tolerable when we was not fully human.

So just as he had done in Azkaban, when the strain became too much for his deeply flawed human form to handle, he slipped into his dog self. Letting his human mind blur with that of the animal, he found that the despair and pain lessened immediately, as the chains slipped from his legs and he was free.

By the time he heard her returning footsteps... saw the the light at the top of the stairs as the door opened... smelled the hated scent of Janet Tewksbury... Padfoot was well-hidden in the shadows, waiting. He even almost managed to suppress a shudder when he heard her call out, as she started down, "I'm back, loverboy, and I've brought you a present!"