Title: Unsteady but Strong

Pairing: Mentioning of Lily x James & Gilderoy x Rita

Character: Lily Evans Potter, Gilderoy Lockhart & Rita Skeeter.

Prompt: How would Lily Evans fare in the Zombie/Inferi apocalypse?

Word Count: 1, 193

Lily's distinctive red hair was put up in a ponytail. It wasn't clean nor very pretty anymore. Neither the smile nor the green eyes were longer what drew the most attention to her face. It was the since long healed scar that went from the right eye down to her lip. Her muscles were aching. Her lungs protesting and her mouth felt about as dry as the Sahara Dessert. Inhuman sounds, growls and calls occasionally made her turn around and shoot another spell into the masses of Inferi that easily followed her. The chase that had almost worn Lily out looked like it hadn't affected them at all. Lily gritted her teeth. This war had taken an unexpected turn when Voldemort decided to use Inferi as his soldiers.

Lily felt a stab at her heart but forced herself to keep running while trying to fend them off.

The Inferi was nothing like the zombies from her childhood scary movies. Zombies walked slow and they ate brains. An Inferi moved with the same speed as any human or faster Lily sometimes thought. They were controlled by someone and followed their master's orders without any regard for their own safety. That allowed them to do things that could hurt or even kill them without a second thought. Just like brains was the only thing on the mind of a zombie; the only thing on the mind of a Inferi was killing. And right now, she was their target.

Thoughts raced through her mind quicker than she could process them. Before Lily had finished thinking about one idea the next one had already presented itself. There were so many things she could do and in the face of impulsively having to choose one Lily found herself missing every one. Another explosion of hate spread inside her body and Lily let out an animalistic scream that almost blended in with the ones behind her. That Voldemort had been cold-hearted enough to do this didn't surprise her. Lily didn't think it beneath him to create an army of mindless soldiers who couldn't care less if they lived or died. But she wished so badly that it had been. Because she would have chosen any fight over this.

"Why did I have to lose you James?"

Lily halted for just a moment. A slamming door caught her attention and without hesitation she hurried inside the building. The door was closed with a bang that hauntingly echoed through the entire building and reminded Lily that she was not yet out of danger. This merely bought her more time so that she could figure out what to do and how to get back to James. This group of Inferi were new she reckoned. They were unstable but strong. A bad combination when walking or running in stairs.

A weak smile appeared on her face as she thought about her raven-haired, skinny husband, his kind smile and the brown eyes that radiated warmth from underneath his glasses even in the cold world they found themselves in. Whenever Lily felt like giving up, even for a moment, she thought of his face and fuelled her exhausted body just like the anger did. Anger and love. Two sides of the same coin.

She ran up two sets of stairs before the murmuring of voices broke through her loud panting. Her legs shook as she raised her wand and approached the door. An Inferi could look no different from a regular person. The only thing that separated them was the white cloud like substance in front of their eyes. Lily had thus far never looked into the empty eyes of an Inferi it was an experience she didn't wish for.

Two heads with blond hair, one looked like a boy while the other looked like a female. They stood close to each other, suddenly silent, while looking out the window. Lily pushed the door open. The two unexpecting people looked straight at her with their eyes wide open in shock. "Expelliarmus. Stupefy."

A female screaming. Not from fear but from anger. Blond hair, just as dirty as Lily's, a naturally pouting mouth with traces of red lipstick and brown eyes that glared at Lily. The redhead looked at the man on the floor. Blond hair, good looking even when lying on the ground, full lips and half a smile on his face despite being unconscious.

"Gilderoy Lockhart and Rita Skeeter." Lily said in between breaths as shakily leaned onto the wall with her hands on her hips. "What on earth are you two doing here?"

Rita rolled her eyes and when she spoke her tone of voice were so laced sarcasm so heavy that one could almost touch it. "We thought we'd take a little holiday. It's a bit stressful getting chased by Inferi every day, we thought we deserved it."

Lily laughed in spite of knowing that wasn't the right response. She knew that a lot of things she had done was wrong and yet she did them. Walking into a grocery store to steal food had definitely been wrong but they hadn't eaten in days. It had been wrong to keep running when so many muggles, wizards and witches had been brutally butchered the day of the attack on Godric's Hollow; but Lily had never the less desperately clung onto James' hand as he brought them to safety. She could still hear the sound of women, men and children screaming in fear. But it wasn't the screaming that woke her up drenched in sweat, gasping for air, and tears running down her cheeks in the middle of the night. It was the silence that followed. Because she knew what the silence meant.

"Did you lose James?" Rita asked as she kneeled in front of Gilderoy.

Lily, for a moment, was stunned that Rita knew who James was. But she quickly regained composure and nodded. "We were a few who survived the attack on Godric's Hollow so we decided to stay together and hide in an abandoned house. We weren't going to stay for more than a few days but the Inferi found us and we had to run; that's when I lost him."

Rita nodded. "So, do you think they're following you?"

Lily nodded. There was not a doubt in her mind. "Yeah, so we should either leave or get ready to fight."

"Well, we can't apparete from this building. Gilderoy already tried and he just began bouncing like a ball between the walls."

Lily nodded. "So, fighting it is then."

The two women looked at each other. They had very little in common. But the one thing they had in common was the fierce stubbornness that bordered on insanity. Neither Rita nor Lily was ready to leave this life and they were going to fight for everything they were worth in order to make sure that they didn't have to. Rita nodded.

"Fighting it is." She gave Lily a questioning smile. "Are you sure you're up for it? You look exhausted."

Lily took one last deep breath. "I'm just a bit unsteady." She assured as her body stopped shaking. "Unsteady but strong."

The end