Hypodermic
Prologue:
"Potter."
Hands gripped her shoulders, shaking her. She rubbed her eyes blearily, before reaching clumsily for her glasses that rested on the potions book atop the bedside table. Her sleepy hands forced them on her face and tugged painfully at the straggled hair behind the lenses. The lantern in the corridor shown through the cracked door dimly, and she could just make out a scrawny silhouette in the otherwise pitch black dormitory.
"Professor?" Lily Potter squeaked, bolting upright.
"Hush," Minerva McGonagall hissed, "or you will wake the others. Quickly, Potter, follow me. Quickly." Lily reached for her robe that laid in a heap on the floor near her bed, shrugging into it as she stood. McGonagall strode from the dormitory, Lily close at her heels. The staircase leading down to the Gryffindor common room seemed unfamiliar as house elves swept dust under rugs and chipped melted wax from beneath candelabras.
"Professor, what's–"
"Has no one ever taught you the meaning of silence, girl?" McGonagall snapped, climbing through the portrait hole with as much grace as one could while doing so. McGonagall was dressed in her usual black robes with her hair twisted severely on top of her head. The only indication that she had been pulled out of bed was the single pink ruffle that protruded at the neckline of her robes, which looked suspiciously like a dressing gown.
McGonagall walked purposefully down several corridors, Lily scuttling along beside her fretfully. Frigid October air whipped Lily's robes around her ankles, and she shivered as McGonagall led her straight to the courtyard and back into the building. They walked down a long corridor, passing several classrooms, before she stopped abruptly near the stairs that descended into the dungeons and spun around to face Lily.
Minerva met Lily Potter's gaze. Something in her composure dissolved as she faced the lanky girl with bright orange hair. She had grown so much over the years, having come to Hogwarts with hair chopped at her chin and buck teeth. Now, she wore her hair long, her bangs cut across her forehead and falling into her big blue eyes. The glasses that had once been round and black transformed into oversized beige and brown speckled things that took up the better portion of her face. She had grown into her teeth, and the freckles that had once smattered her entire body vanished, remaining only across her nose and up her cheekbones.
Lily was nearly eyelevel with McGonagall now, and the professor's chest constricted when she saw the young woman in front of her quickly retracting into a child. "Miss Potter," McGonagall said very quickly, "I am afraid that what you are about to see might disturb you."
Lily hesitated, peering past McGonagall and down the dark staircase. "Is it my brother?" Lily whispered, meeting McGonagall's piercing eyes once more. Her throat had only felt this tight once before, when she was very small and her mother had given her a peanut.
McGonagall was stricken. "You knew?"
Lily was walking a very fragile line. "He gets very ill when he tries to stop."
McGonagall turned, all sympathy vanishing from her face. Lily grabbed her arm.
"Headmistress, wait," she said frantically. McGonagall spun back around, her eyes trained on Lily's pale fingers that still gripped her wrist. "You mustn't tell our parents. You mustn't tell anyone," Lily pleaded. "After last year, you must know that our family can not take another scandal. Not after James. Not because of this. I will tell you everything, as long as you do not relay any of it to my parents. Aunt Minerva, please let me explain."
McGonagall's eyes flashed up to Lily's face, having not heard the words "Aunt Minerva" since the Potter children had been just babies. "Lily Potter–"
"Oh, you haven't told them already, have you?" Tears blurred Lily's vision, and McGonagall's expression softened fractionally.
"No, Lily, I have not contacted them. I hoped to get some information before I turned your father's life upside down again." McGonagall hesitated. Lily continued to stare at her pleadingly. "Very well. You will give me an explanation, and I will decide when and if we will notify your parents. In the mean time, you must make him well again. I will turn a blind eye to how you do it and where you get it from" – despite McGonagall's steely eyes, Lily deflated in relief – "just this once. He is in the last room in the dungeons. Assure that he is well enough to attend his lessons tomorrow, and meet me in my office directly after, preferably before sunrise. Do not dally."
"Yes, Professor," Lily softly.
"Miss Potter, please believe me when I say that after all of this is sorted, you and whoever else is involved will face the most severe consequences." Lily had never seen McGonagall look so serious.
"Yes, Professor," Lily repeated.
Lily did not move. McGonagall's eyes narrowed, but Lily looked straight past her, at the dark staircase that led into the dungeons. After several long moments, McGonagall stepped past Lily, and began walking in the direction they had come. When Lily was sure McGonagall was gone, she descended the steps into the dungeons.
Lily wondered if McGonagall would have walked all the way to the Gryffindor towers to retrieve Lily if she had known the real solution was only steps away from where Albus resided, cold and cowering on the stone floor of the dungeons. The solution was protected by a password and fast asleep behind heavy green curtains in a four-poster bed.