Disclaimer: I do not own anyone in the Harry Potter Universe. This story is for entertainment purposes only. Please enjoy, and comment wit constructive criticism and/or what you enjoyed about the chapter. Thank you.

~*o*~

By nature, she's a perfectionist. By choice, she's a leader. But when all is said and all is done, the very essence of her is that of a warrior. And she'll be damned if she goes down without a fight.

~*o*~

Lily was exhausted. She had propped herself up on her right palm, elbow digging into the hard desk, and had resigned herself to the inevitability that was drifting off. It wasn't for lack of trying to stay awake. In fact, she found it regrettable that her brain felt so murky, and that her eyelids were rebelling, because in theory, the class was interesting. Well, maybe it could've been if they hadn't been stuck with such a dunce for a teacher. On some undisturbed, unheard of level, she felt bad for thinking that. In all fairness, he was probably a nice person- at least when he was alive. But for all of her self-righteous behavior regarding the importance of each class, she couldn't find it in herself to appreciate History of Magic or Professor Binns, or find the will to stay awake.

She discreetly yawned and twisted to survey the rest of the class, noting that they didn't seem to be faring any better.

It's a damn shame too, she recognized silently.

Before she had gone to Hogwarts, she had gone to St. Mary's, a Catholic girls school. Back then, before her fated introduction to magic, before she had classes in which she could learn to turn teacups into frogs, her favorite class had been history. Admittedly, she knew that many of the lessons were biased, were unabashedly pro-European, but it didn't deter her from scouring the library in search of any knowledge on the past. It used to be one of her great passions; searching for causes to fight for, to learn about, to simply care. To be young enough to not truly understand the effects of war, but old enough to distantly mourn the lives it took.

Maybe she misses that most of all.

The distant feeling. The feeling of paging through a book and marveling at the fantasy of glory, but in not having to deal with the suffering that comes with it. The feeling of security, one in which you aren't scrutinized by a stranger for simply existing, of being sneered at for your blood. The feeling when a war hasn't been thrust onto your doorstep and left for you to fight.

Truly, it was a damn shame that Professor Binns was so oblivious to the world outside of his own voice. Maybe if he had, then some people would understand what she had gleaned from every book on individual wars that had ever passed through her hands.

They were all the same.

It was always about power, about climbing the hidden ranks of the world. And then it was about keeping power. About blindly trusting whatever the leader of your movement told you. That no sides were without ruin and horror, and none were without good intentions. That in a world of grey, there was no black or white sides. No good or bad. Just fighters. And she was sick of it.

She skinned her knee once running away from a pack of Slytherins, back before she uncovered her flair for dueling and had fostered it into fruition. It wasn't anything terrible, not enough to necessitate a trip to the hospital wing(or dealing with the humiliation that came with one), but it had caused her to wonder.

The blood was a thick, crimson color. One half of the two colors of Gryffindor, if a bit darker in shade. She had stared at it blankly, until she realized why she was stricken.

She had always been told that her blood was inferior, was filthy, did not belong in the magic world.

But it was red.

It was red like Snape's blood when Potter had sent a Jelly-Legs curse at him, and his hands had scraped as he fell onto pebbles, stopping his face from colliding with the ground.

It was red like Mulciber's blood when Potter- oh, that bloody tosser if he wasn't a godsend that day- had broke his nose(he had a hell of a right hook) when he had sent a nasty curse at Lily in 5th year.

She was stricken because, albeit subconsciously, she had realized the one thing could break the bonds that had held her back; she was just as worthy as everyone else.

In a sorry way, she supposed she partially had to thank the Slytherins for that. Maybe she would, just to piss them off.

Ha.

As if they'd even let her get close enough to talk.

Either way, Lily and her epiphany were not about to back down anytime soon, and she'd be damned if they were to squash her spirits like they wanted to.

She realized all wars were the same when she, in a despairing moment, wondered how she'd possibly survive it. How they could possibly win against such overwhelming amounts of hate.

Wars were only one when people stopped believing, stopped fighting, stopped caring, stopped hoping.

And Lily was a warrior in her soul, with a passion for history and a penchant for lost causes.

But the darkness was still creeping, and had not yet enveloped the skies. Maybe there was still time to live like the 17 year old girl she was.

She sighed, and puffed out her cheeks, running a tongue along her front teeth.

She was still bloody exhausted, and has paid absolutely none of her waning attention to the lecture. However, she supposed it was important to pay attention if she was going to take her N.E.W.T.S this year and actually pass.

Evidently, stuck in her stupor as she was, time had flown past and it was soon time to leave that horrid classroom. She shouldered her bag, thanking Merlin that she had put Extension and Feather-light charms on it(and also that she was bloody fantastic at charms), and walked out of the classroom.

~*o*~

Strolling through the corridors to her next class, she caught sight of Seve- Snape's back through the crowd and out of habit, felt the urge to catch up with him, in hopes of catching a second of his time to talk with him about his day.

Of course, she didn't, not being as obtuse as a certain other Gryffindor believed her to be and-

Bollocks.

That certain other Gryffindor.

That certain other Gryffindor was in her next class.

Snape, in his path to become a Potions Master was also in her class.

And the tension between them (unlikely as it was to increase as it already seemed to be at nuclear level) was even more palpably explosive this year.

She wiped a bead of sweat off of her crinkled brow and sighed again.

Maybe the universe was out to get her today, even more so than usual, because dear Merlin, this bloody school and these bloody rivalries would be the death of her.