Hola! I'm getting this one in on time! Wahoo, go me!

It's an awfully, awfully short chapter, this one, but it finishes on such a good…finish…that I had to stop. Don't worry, though! No cliffie! I swear!

This story is also continuously turning out more and more back story than I had at first realised – I found myself writing bits of Lily and james's wedding yesterday – and because of that the chapter layout may change in a few chapoters time, but I'll give you more warning if and when it happens.

Fresh ginger biscuits to PHEONIX39, seikinoko, Len87 and Mei1105 for their lovely reviews! But still none of you have quite guessed the actual happenings, although a few got pretty close!

On with the chapter!


The six adults were once more gathered in the living room of the Potters home. The two children had disappeared – Remus presumed to bed – and Dumbledore had returned, carrying two stone basins, about the length and width of your average kitchen sink, but shallower. One contained a shivery, silver liquid; while the other was empty, and it was with great reverence that Dumbledore placed them on the table in the centre of the room. Chairs had been abandoned in favour of the floor, and now they all sat, gathered around the strange bowls, listening to Dumbledores explanation.

"These," he began, "are penasi. That's plural for pensive. A pensive is basically a way of viewing memories – the actual event, not the vague, half formed idea that lives in your head. The brain is like an enormous filing cabinet, every event stored neatly away. If you know where to look, you can pour every moment of your life into this, and view it all over again."

"So you think our memories are still in here," James said, tapping his head, "and you want to take them out, put them one of these bowl things and let us watch them all over again?"

"Yes and no. I do believe all your memories are still with you, locked up out of reach. But to view them all would take another 37 years – there is no fast forward button. No, what I hope to try is to extract from you a few early memories, of each of your childhoods. I am hoping that, once the way is open, the rest will simply unfold."

"So, quite literally, our lives would flash before our eyes." Said Lily.

Dumbledore smiled. "That is what I hope."

"So how do they get their memories in there?" Frowned Cam, looking from her friends to the stone basins and back.

Dumbledore sighed. "Normally, a witch or wizard would use their wands to remove the memory. The removal itself is not tricky – you simply need to think of where in your life the event occurred, and in this case I will help you from putting in too much. However, with Remus' or my own wand, the effect will not be as good as if you had your own. A wand will never work as well for anyone else as it does its owner."

Dumbledore drew out his wand, and the four non-wand bearers leaned forward to examine it.

"It looks like a stick." Said Cam.

Dumbledore smiled. "A stick, maybe. But could a stick do this?" He waved his wand in the air, and a bunch of flowers appeared out of nowhere. Dumbledore took them and handed them to Cam.

"They're real." She gasped, touching them gingerly.

"Well, I guess that's proof, if ever we needed it." Said James, sounding impressed. "Flowers out of thin air. Useful for valentines day."

Lily and Cam both looked indignant, causing the four men in the room to all chuckle.

"Now," Said Dumbledore, suddenly serious again, "Lily. James."

He offered Lily his wad, and James took Remus'.

"Take the wands." Dumbledore instructed. "And place them to your foreheads."

Hey both did so, watching Dumbledore with a mixture of nerves and excitement.

"I'm going to have to help you now." He said, moving to it next to Lily and gripping her wand arm. "I need you to think back as far as you can. Ignore the fact that you can't remember it; just go to the point in the darkness where your early memories should be. Ill help guide you, Lily. Remus, if you could."

Remus nodded, and moved net to James, imitating the headmasters' movements.

"Now. Picture the moment of the memory. Remus and I are here to help pin point the right spot, so don't worry. Just feel the point of the memory you want, and slowly bring your wand away from your head and into one of the basins."

Slowly, with only slightly shaking hands, first Lily, then James, began to move their wands towards the penesi, Lily into the empty one, James into the fuller. Cams hand rushed to her mouth to prevent the gasp from escaping and possibly ruining her friends concentration as a strange silver thread started to come away from their foreheads.

"And…stop." Dumbledore pulled slightly on Lily's arm, and Remus copied him with James's, and the silver disappeared.

All four sat back, letting out breath they hadn't realised they had been holding.

"So that's it?" Asked Cam curiously, peering at the silver liquid that had appeared in the bottom of Lily's basin.

"That's it." Agreed Dumbledore. "Memory."

"So what do we do now?" Asked James, frowning slightly at the bowl. "Drink it?"

Dumbledore smiled. "No. You place your wands into the substance. That will transport you inside the memory – you will see everything going on, but they will not see you. Since the memory is very short, once it is finished, you will instantly come back out again. Hopefully, that will be the trigger you need."

James nodded. "Ok." He took a deep breath and looked at his wife. "Ready?"

Lily nodded. "Ready."

As one, each raised their wand, and, with only a slight hesitation, plunged them into their respective pensive. There was a moment when their bodies went rigid, and then they both fell very, very still.

"What's happened to them?" Asked Cam quietly, gazing at their still faces.

"Don't worry. Their minds have gone into the pensive. They're quite safe."

Neither Cam nor mark looked very reassured, but they said no more.

It would have been a stranger sight, had anyone been peering in through the window. Four adults, three men and one woman, sitting round two bowls and two apparently dead bodies, in an odd vigil, seemingly oblivious to anything else. And, tucked away in one corner, forgotten about for the time being, a small shadow watching the goings on with wide green eyes, peering through ropey wet red hair.

They sat for some ten minutes without either of the Potters moving a single muscle. Then, almost un-noticed, one of Lily's fingers twitched. Then another. Her eyelids fluttered, but did not open, and her breathing deepened. Moments later, James did the same.

"The memories have finished." Said Dumbledore softly. "Now we must see if it worked."

James opened his eyes first. He sat up slowly, gingerly rubbing one arm to restart the circulation, looking up at the worried faces around him with a blank look.

Until he saw Remus.

There was a silence, not the comfortable silence of assembled friends, but a tension filled, wary one. Remus gazed back at James unblinkingly, keeping a carefully neutral face.

"Moony." Crocked James at last, emotion seeping out of every letter. Remus felt a wave of relief and joy and everything else sweep over him, and without realising that either of them had moved, the two suddenly found themselves in each other's arms, hugging and laughing and crying all at once. Remus kissed James's forehead before burying his face in his friends shoulder, breathing in the scent that his werewolfily strengthened nostrils had flared at from the moment they entered the house, hardly noticing the tears that were streaming down his cheeks, or the damp patch that was growing on his shoulder, indicating the same thing was happening to James.

Suddenly, another pair of arms appeared out of no-where, snaking their way between James and Remus, and a third head burrowed in between them. Not caring that their heads were banging against each other, that James's glasses were digging into the bridge of his nose, that Lily's hands still had wet paint on them which was quickly transferring itself onto Remus' clothes, not even noticing the strange noises coming from their own mouths – crying and laughing at the same time, leaving watery prints all over each others clothes, occasionally with one pair of lips finding another's forehead or cheek or shoulder…the three friends lost themselves in each other, and, for a moment at least, everything was perfect.


Awww, bless 'em….A couple of pretty boring chapters now, I'm afraid…but chapters 12 and 13 are currently looking pretty good!

And remember – if you have me on alert/favourites without reviewing…I know who you are, where you live, and I have access to highly dangerous veterinary drugs and an even more highly dangerous cockerel called Errol…so REVIEW!

See you all next Monday!