Character: Lily Luna Potter
Challenge: Snakes and Ladders Challenge
Prompt: N/A
Era: Next Generation
Summary: Lily Luna Potter wants to be an Auror. Training will be something else.
Daddy, I'm Going to be an Auror
"Dad!"
Lily raced down the steps, her feet pounding the hardwood on her way down. Harry emerged from the kitchen, his glasses fogged up from the steam caused by the chicken.
"Look!"
She appeared at his side and proudly presented the crisp paper to him. He pushed his glasses up on his nose and opened it.
"You got your NEWTs back?" he asked, turning it over to read.
Lily Luna Potter
Gryffindor 7th Year
Potions O
Defense Against the Dark Arts E
Transfiguration E
Herbology E
Charms O
Alchemy E
Arithmancy A
Ancient Runes E
"I messed up the Arithmancy exam pretty badly," she admitted.
Harry blinked down at the results. Lily shot him a nervous glance. He wasn't disappointed, was he? They weren't as good as Albus's results, of course, but she'd beaten James by a ton of points!
"I," he said hoarsely, "am so proud of you. My little girl, all grown up."
Lily grinned, taking the paper and folding it up before she hugged him.
"Daddy, I'm going to be an Auror."
He paused, and held her out at arm's length. He worked his jaw, eyes narrowed.
"You're worried."
"It's dangerous work."
"You do it!" she protested.
He sighed, and hugged her tighter.
~o0o~
Lily would have recognized the curly blonde hair anywhere. King. Of course he would be a bloody Auror, why not? He noticed her at about the same time that she noticed her.
"Hello, Potter," he said smoothly.
One of his cronies, standing next to him, sniggered.
"Grow up, Wilson," she snapped. "Hello, King."
"Getting by on Daddy's name again, are we?"
Her hand twitched towards her wand, but she didn't see a reason to get herself thrown out of the program. It had taken a lot of work to get there in the first place.
"You wish," she told him. "Isn't that how you got in?"
Gerald King, Bradley's father, was one of the best Aurors in the division. Harry always complained about him, though. Apparently he was a loose cannon, often more danger to the others around him then to the Dark Wizards they were attempting to apprehend. Still, he was one of the most skilled ones they had, so they couldn't just let him walk away.
He threw her a dirty look, but he didn't have time to say anything, because a call came from up front.
"Oi! Listen up!"
Lily broke into a grin when she saw who had called. Harry had hinted at some of the senior Auror trainees leading the sessions, but he'd kept this secret!
"I'm Rose Weasley, and this is my soon-to-be partner Scorpius Malfoy, but for this training, we'll be Weasley and Malfoy, got it?"
She glared fiercely around the room, and even Lily was cowed by the venom in her cousin's stare. Rose's eyes landed on King, who had smirked at the sound of Scorpius's name. King squirmed a little.
"Now, let's start with—"
A crash resounded around the room and the wall to Lily's left exploded, bits of plaster flying everywhere. Rose took a hit to her skull and went down. Scorpius dove on her and shielded her from the rest before dragging her unconscious body to the side. Lily's heart leapt into her throat as a crowd of people clothed entirely in black surged into the room.
Everything was mass hysteria. With only one trained person in the room, most people were flinging themselves behind Scorpius, hindering his movements. Lily's eyes flicked around the room, assessing the situation. The steam of people didn't seem to stop, and she didn't have too much time left to think before she had to enter the fight.
"Reducto!" she yelled.
The ceiling tumbled to the ground, blocking the exit. King pounced in an instant, warding the blockade faster than she would have ever thought possible.
With the entrance blocked, the rest of the trainees regained their confidence and entered the battle, just in time for Rose to stand up.
"All right, hold your fire," she said.
The trainees kept dueling for a minute, but once it became appearent that the others weren't going to attack any time soon, they stopped.
"That was your first test."
Rose weaved through the crowd. Now that she was so close, Lily could see that she was completely uninjured. She wondered if Scorpius had known she was all right and the beginning was an act, or if his shielding of her was instinct.
Of the thirty trainees, Rose tapped five. Four had fled the room through the door they had entered, and one had hidden behind the doorframe and cried. They understood their dismissal and rose to leave, all blushing furiously.
"This is a hard program," Scorpius said, speaking up for the first time. "If you can't handle that, then you'd never be able to handle the real thing. My advice to you is to always have your guard up. You weren't expecting this. If it wasn't for some quick thinking on the part of your peers—" he nodded at King and Lily "—then you would have 'died.' As a great man once said 'Constant Vigilance.' You never know when the attack might come."
He and Rose moved through the crowd again, putting people into partnerships.
"Odds are, this person will be the one to have your back when you head out into field training three years from now," said Rose. "Potter, over here."
She pointed directly at King. Lily felt her heart stop.
"You two seem to work well together already."
"Rose—Rose, not him, not him he's the boy that—"
Rose turned to her, a rather icy glint in her eyes. "Lily, you reacted almost simultaneously, and I'd be surprised if that wasn't your next move."
Lily bit her lip. Warding the debris had, in fact, been her next idea for protecting the entrance.
"Scorpius and I are like that, too. We can anticipate each other. I'm not going to deprive you of a great partner because you're too wrapped up in a schoolchild rivalry."
Lily wandered over with a foul expression.
Three years later, they graduated top of their class.
