It was almost starling how quickly the pain returned to Remus' joint, once having left Sirius' embrace. Every step he took away from Sirius seemed to worsen the pain, and hadn't it been for the adrenalin, the sight of the patronus had released into his system, Remus was certain he would have collapsed; amazingly, Remus' legs kept moving even far after he had lost feeling in them.<br/>His hands felt numb as he tore open the patio door, just as the hare had reached the doorstep. Immediately, Marlene's voice rang, calmly proclaiming: "Pumpkin pastry."<br/>"Oh, thank Merlin," Remus exhaled, not realising he had been holding his breath out of sheer fear. Marlene's patronus hadn't been sent in a panic. His relief cut ahead of Marlene's voice listing off a series of coded coordinates, and he was barely able to register beyond the fact that she was safe. "Let's go -"<br/><br/>__________________________________________________________<br/><br/>Remus was so deeply exhausted, he was certain he could go to sleep and never wake up; this was, however, a repeating sensation. He knew rationally it must be close to 9 am on the morning after the moon, but in the windowless bathroom it was hard to tell that dawn had broke; and after all, it didn't matter much.<br/>Remus was seated on the bathroom counter, his bare back and legs resting against the cool mirror and stone counter. Every single muscle in his body felt tense and sore after the night, but it was nothing compared to the pain he had felt in his joints before.<br/>He was wearing nothing but boxers, and the only reason he was still somewhat awake was on Sirius' request, who wanted to clean his wounds before getting into<span style="font-style: italic">dirty sheets</span>. Remus himself felt like he had survived the night in fairly good shape.<br/>Ever since Remus had started spending the moons in the basement bunker, the amounts of cuts he afflicted onto himself was decreased drastically; now, it had been common for him to get asphalt burns on his shoulders and knees after trashing at the concrete walls and floor.<br/>Distractedly, Remus had turned his head to his left, inattentively scratching at the skin bordering to the graze that covered the better part of his left shoulder and forearm. "How much do you think it would take to get the entire basement padded?"<br/>Without turning his head, his eyes found Sirius and a tired smile appeared on his lips.