Chapter 11: Remember
James and Lily stumbled into the Gryffindor Common Room,having spent the last couple of hours helping the teachers rush around the school, throwing stubborn students back into their Common Rooms and keeping them, all the while trying to figure out what was going on.
After a while, they gave up.
Both of them plopped down on the couch on front of the fireplace next to Alice, looking thoroughly exhausted.
"Did you two find out what happened?" Sirius asked eagerly. This was accompanied by querying faces on the rest of them. None of them had taken too kindly to being stuffed into their Common Room and locked there in the middle of a Quidditch and a prank.
James sighed and shook his head.
"We did tell Professor Dumbledore about the mysterious figure though." Lily chipped in, head on James' shoulder.
"And?" Alice asked.
"And he thanked us for that information but didn't say anything. He didn't even have a visible reaction to it."
"So maybe he knows it's nothing for us to be worried about?"
"Or maybe he knows we will worry too much about it and that's why he has refused to tell us anything." James said slowly.
"Maybe." Remus murmured, knowing who James was thinking about. He was proven right.
"I wish my parents were still around," James growled in frustration. "I could just send an owl over and know what the hell is going on in two hours."
Lily stroked his hand to soothe him, but it didn't really work.
"You know, James, you never did tell us what exactly happened to them." Sirius said. This was greeted with surprise, because while the rest of them were to afraid to probe into the details of that incident, they always assumed Sirius knew, because he had always been the closest to James' family.
James brushed a little dirt off his Quidditch robes, and took a deep breath. This was the first time he had allowed himself to think about anything remotely connected to his parents since they passed away without a warning, and all the pain and regret came rushing back.
Lily gripped his hand harder, knowing how sensitive this issue was to him.
"You guys know how my father is the Head of the Aurors?" He began. The rest nodded.
"Harold! Hey, Harold!" A loud voice sounded around the Atrium in the Ministry, just as Harold Potter was about to step into grated fireplace that would have brought him home.
He turned, and saw his deputy sprinting across the Atrium, stopping breathless in front of him. Harold laughed. Old Bertie always did panic about the smallest things.
"What is it, Bert? Relax, catch your breath, and tell me." He said.
"We just got an owl from our spies." Bert managed to gasp out.
The Ministry's spies, generally, did not use owls as a form of communications due to their susceptibility to interception.
"An owl?"
"Yeah. There was no time to go through our usual chain of contacts, and a Patronus would have been too hard and unreliable to conjure, considering the location of this particular spy."
Harold suspected 'this spy' referred to someone near Voldemort, then. Information compartmentalisation was so tight in his department now even he did not know the details of some of his subordinates' job scope, as his high profile position and status in the Magical World made him a huge target for Voldemort.
The Atrium was only dimly lit, as most of the workers, even with their extra workload in the midst of war, had gone home. He had been working for too hard lately. Sighing, he put the Floo powder back into the pouch next to the fireplace and dusted his hands off.
"What was it about?" He inquired, beginning to walk back to his office in resignation.
"Actually, about you, sir."
Harold stopped in his tracks.
"What about me, Bert?" Harold asked quietly.
"Their target for the attack tonight, sir. It's you and Mrs Potter."
Laura Potter sighed and signalled for the house elves to clear the table. It was getting late, and it seemed like her husband wasn't going to be home tonight, again.
It wasn't as if she asked for much. She understood how important her husband and his work was to the Magical World, but sometimes it felt like she only saw him for five minutes every three days or so when he came back to take a shower.
He had explained everything to her, and she was a smart woman as well, and she knew the harder he worked the more probable it would be that the war would end and she would get the man she loved back again, but sometimes it was just so hard.
And to make things worse, her rascal of a son, James, and his unofficially adopted brother, Sirius, were at their last year at Hogwarts, and even if they did destroy every single thing they came into contact with at least they provided some joy-
"Madam, there is lots of men at the doors!" Hicky the house elf said, bowing at the doorway of the Dining Room.
Laura paled. Trembling, she waved for the house elf to let them in, because she was a Potter and she would be damned if she didn't at least give everyone who came to her door a grand welcome.
Harold pulled his own black cloak over his shoulders, rushing out to the Apparition point to meet the rest of his team.
"Sir, are you sure you want do this personally? I mean-" Bert began in a desperate bid to keep his boss from doing something he thought insane, but the day Harold Potter listened to anyone other than himself had not yet come.
"Yes, I'm sure, Bert. She's my wife, and if I can't even protect my own family then I'm not fit to lead the Aurors." He said impatiently, and with a nod around to the hastily assembled team of Aurors, he was gone.
Harold Potter and his team Apparated straight into his own dining room, as the Death Eaters had systematically re-routed the wards protecting the house, as if to prove that they could, that they had someone inside the Ministry providing them with enough information to bring every single protection he had laid on the mansion to waste.
He took it all in.
His wife of more than twenty years, slumped in her seat, never to get her last dinner with her beloved husband.
His house elves lying on the floor, having served his family for the last time tonight.
The pictures of his son, smashed and shattered, thrown from their rightful place over the mantelpiece.
And the thirty Death Eaters massed around him and his team, waiting for them.
When the Minister of Magic had himself stepped through the debris of the Potter Mansion, he wept for the man destined to be his successor.
"And I haven't thought about them until today," James finished, his eyes telling all of them of the regret he had in being unable to even say goodbye.
"Hey James," Sirius said, after a long silence filled with soft sniffling.
"Yeah?' He looked up.
"We'll get them back. We'll become Aurors, and we'll get those pricks back for what they did."
James laughed bitterly. "Yeah. And not just for what they did to my parents. We'll get them back for everything they've done to everyone."
The rest concurred, even if they not all of them were going to make it, or would want to be Aurors. They were all going to fight back, in their own ways.
Up in his office, Albus Dumbledore was having a sucky day. It was not very appropriate for a grand old warlock like him to use such words, it was true, but he had to say it. He was a having sucky, sucky day.
Damn Voldemort ruined the best of days. And he really was having a very enjoyable one, what with Peeves being locked into the commentator's box, and some very exciting play by the Gryffindor team, but he had to stop the match and lock his beloved students back into their dorms.
Filch had run up to him during the match, being one of the few people who did not enjoy match days, and told him that he had found a dozen dead Acromantulas at the edge of the forest, and a suspicious figure lurking around at the same spot who disappeared when he went nearer to investigate.
Anyone who could kill twelve Acromantulas posed a huge danger to his students, and therefore Dumbledore had sent everyone back to where they were presumably safe.
And then later on his two head students had come to him with a story about a dark figure, possibly the same person, lurking around the place at midnight two weeks back when he left the school.
Whether the two events were linked or not, he knew very well that if they had any sinister connotations only one person could be behind it: Tom Marvolo Riddle.
And Dumbledore was not happy about that. Not happy at all.
"What are you planning, Tom?" Dumbledore asked aloud softly, his silver instruments tinkling and smoking away in his office.
The students, to their great relief, were allowed out of their Common Rooms the next day for breakfast. Unfortunately, it was also Monday, which meant they would also be allowed out for their Common Rooms for lessons.
"We have lessons today?" Sirius exclaimed, outraged, seconds after he had whooped in joy as Professor McGonagall had stepped into the Gryffindor Common Room, allowing them to go for breakfast.
"Hogwarts is still a school, Mr Black, and therefore, yes, there will still be lessons." Professor McGonagall replied sternly, before turning in a flurry of robes and leaving. The Fat Lady's portrait closed after her.
"I'm screwed," Sirius groaned, slumping into his couch. The three guys laughed.
"Let me guess," Lily said, rolling her eyes. "You haven't done your homework?"
"Well I didn't expect there to be school today, did I?" Sirius replied.
"It's Monday. How would there be no school?"
"But they cancelled Quidditch. Surely, if they cancelled Quidditch, they have to cancel classes! Quidditch is the most important thing around here!" Sirius argued indignantly.
Lily decided not to argue with this decidedly strange line of logic, and headed for breakfast with everyone else.
"So, Padfoot, what are you going to-" James began as they walked down the corridor, but was cut off.
"Now isn't the time to give me your I-told-you-so speech, Jamsie-poo." Sirius said, his face grim at the prospect of facing his teacher's wrath in approximately forty-five minutes' time.
"I wasn't going to give you that speech," James said, feigning hurt. "And I told you not to call me by that name."
"Why not? Your mother does it all the- You know what? Never mind. Right now I need to find a way to not die a horrible death." Sirius retorted but managed to catch himself in time.
"Why not just call in sick?" Remus put in.
Sirius turned to look at his friend incredulously, as though he would never have expected the Prefect thought up such an evil and diabolical idea. Most people wouldn't. On the other hand, the Marauders weren't most people. The girls, however, were.
"Remus! You're a Prefect!" Alice admonished.
Remus Lupin shrugged, as if to say 'yeah whatcha gonna do about that', and strolled into the Great Hall.
"You know, Remus Lupin as a bad boy is really sexy." Kelly laughed out to Alice as they followed him into the Hall. Peter's ears rose at that.
Sirius did call in sick, as it turned out. He simply disappeared after breakfast, and James had to tell Professor Flitwick of the gruesome and disgusting symptoms Sirius was currently experiencing in excruciating detail, in a resigned, my-best-friend's-a-retard tone.
At the back of their Charms class, the girls were taking advantage of the general chaos to get some private conversation time.
"So?" Lily began, raising her eyebrows at Alice.
"So what?" she replied, innocent as an angel.
"So you've been avoiding our every question about Frank, that's what." Kelly replied, and Lily nodded in agreement.
Alice looked around, and saw there was obviously no way she was going to get out of this one.
"Alright," she sighed. "What do you two want?"
"Everything!" Kelly squealed. "We are your girlfriends. And girlfriends are supposed to get all this information voluntarily, Alice. I'm hurt."
At this she pouted. Several Ravenclaw boys from across the class nudged each other and suppressed grins. Kelly ignored them.
"Let's start with the date." Lily said to start her off.
"It was fine."
"Fine?"
"It really was!"
"You gonna give us details, sugar, or are we going to have to hex them out of you?" Lily said, her eyes narrowed.
Alice stared with apprehension at the tip of Lily's wand. While she would have liked to believe that Lily would never do such a thing to her, she had enough experience while trying to pry information about her and James to know that it was really frustrating.
She gave in.
"Oh alright. He picked me up at the Great Hall, as you very well know."
"Go on," Lily growled. Kelly dodged a Stunner that had just bounced off James' Shield Charm, thankful for her Seeker reflexes.
"He was really sweet, and brought me flowers." Both Lily and Kelly 'awwww-ed' at this.
And considering how she was so reluctant to talk at the start, she actually had a lot of fun describing the rest of her date with Frank.
"See, that wasn't so hard, right?" Lily said in satisfaction, having 'ooohhh-ed' and 'ahhhh-ed' at all the right moments.
Alice laughed and stowed her wand as Flitwick signalled that the class had ended with a look of great relief on his face, and never even bothered to take attendance. Somehow, the Professor hated to teach Shield Charms.
Peter was struggling at his table, his face apparently hexed to have dozens of full blown pimples.
"Ewww," Kelly said, and made sure to keep her distance, as Remus and James tried to hold Peter still to reverse the hex.
"Don't worry Pete, we'll get that Ravenclaw prick back for you," James assured him when they finally managed to cure Peter of his weird affliction.
"Yeah, maybe some of that description of Sirius you were putting up for Flitwick earlier would come in handy." Remus said.
The girls stared at Remus in newfound admiration again, rediscovering the werewolf they had called friend for years.
Peter made some excuse to go to the toilet, saying he'll meet up with them for the next class.
No one really noticed.
The Marauders managed to scrape a free period after lunch, so they went up to the Common Room, where they found Sirius sleeping soundly on the couch.
"Move over, you big lump." James said as he bodily hauled Sirius up so he occupied less space.
"You're a big lump." Sirius retorted sleepily.
"Your mom's a big lump."
"Can't argue with that." Sirius laughed.
"So what have you been doing, other than sleeping in and missing lunch?" Remus asked.
"What? I missed lunch?" Sirius exclaimed. "NOOOOOOOOOOOO-"
"Get over it." Remus cut him off.
"You get over it."
"You're mom's getting over- okay, can we not do this again?" James said.
"But if I go down for lunch now, all the Professors would know I'm actually fit for classes!"
"So go for the freaking classes. You've already skived off half a day of lessons."
"But I haven't done any homework."
"Then what the hell have you been doing?"
"You know, general...Marauding?"
"We're not in fourth year anymore, Sirius, that's not gonna get you off the hook anymore." Remus said, laughing.
"What, the 'Maruaders' too cool for you now?"
"No, the name's still pretty damn awesome, but you need to get over it, Sirius."
"Why? I came up with it, genius that I am."
"Yeah, well, genius, maybe it's time you got some homework done." James said.
"Pah. Work is for mortals. Sirius Black is way above all that mundane crap."
"Hey, Professor McGonagall said she would come up to check on you, see if you're really in bed."
"What? And you never deigned to tell me that until now?" Sirius jumped in alarm, much to the others' amusement.
"Get me some food from dinner," he said, and disappeared into their dormitory to feign illness again.
The Marauders laughed.
"Seriously, what is up with Alice?" Kelly said as they failed to find her again, walking up to their Arithmancy class. "She hasn't sat with us for meals for days!"
"I know. She must really like Frank." Lily opined.
"Okay, drool over Frank all you want, girl, but I want my Alice baaaackkkkkkkkk." Kelly whined.
Lily laughed. "Try and be happy for her?"
"I'm trying, but it's not working. What about her thing with Sirius anyway?"
"Just between you and me, I think Frank's a much better boyfriend than Sirius."
"Easy for you to judge us mortals when the Head Boy's hanging off your little finger."
"Shut up. And I'm serious about that Sirius over Frank thing. Let James find out I think Frank's better than his best friend and I would be in for it."
"Yeah right. James would probably choose the deaths of the whole of Hogwarts over letting you have a scratch."
"Shut up." Lily said, but grinned in spite of herself.
A/N: Hey to everyone again. New update! Sorry if the start's a little gloomy. My father passed away two weeks ago, and I felt I had to write that part as a little tribute to the best father anyone could hope to have. Right now I'm dividing my time between fanfiction, playing Seasons In The Sun on my guitar and watching How I Met Your Mother, so expect more updates soon. Reviews are the bomb. I happen to like bombs.
