Sirius easily caught the book and began thumbing through pages, muttering this would have been far easier if his twat of a friend would just hand it to him rather than losing his place every time. James ignored this and went to retrieve his son from Remus, quickly stepping out to change his diaper in the slight delay and then nestling back next to his wife with their child between them as Sirius started with residual triumph for Harry's finally able to speak out like he did.

"It's good to know I'm not everybody's top priority," Harry said indulgently. He may have a good feeling about that paper, but he still wasn't sure how much good it would do, so best to put it out of his mind for now.

Lily huffed in agitation that vile woman was pressing her son for those details, hating the irony that Skeeter had finally gotten her exclusive article she'd always wanted, but at least happy enough Harry was on board with this one.

"Guess it's better than calling you a nutter again," James frowned at this continuation, clearly the Death Eater breakout hadn't been good enough to push someone who should know Harry on

some level back into reason.

"You think Dean's secretly helping Seamus with all the spells he's learning from the DA?" James asked.

"Well I'm sure Dean hasn't exactly told where he's learned them from," Sirius reminded of Hermione's little spell with a proud smirk, "but I wouldn't be surprised either."

Remus let out a low whistle of surprise for such a long running practice, his two friends looking far more disappointed they hadn't gotten to hear about that instead of two/ thirds of that

Hogsmeade visit.

"At least Hermione can talk you through it," Lily told him, glad that her son had seemed to follow their commentary well enough, but it would still be even better if someone had explained this to him in his time.

"I'd rather just never speak of it again," Harry grumbled.

"Well I'm glad you're chatting with her about this," James smirked, "far more than I ever got, you've now experienced Sirius' advice first hand."

"Hey!" Sirius yelped, "it's not my fault the woman's the most stubborn creature at school." Sirius clearly repeated an old statement.

Lily raised a brow at him, before looking at a suddenly uncomfortable James, and asked, "exactly how many of your blasted attempts were of his doing?"

James had the grace to fail to answer that, Remus was laughing too hard to answer, and Sirius kept going loudly so he wouldn't have to.

"Hey!" Harry spluttered, now much preferring his mum's words.

Lily was still watching James critically, and he was happily ignoring her look by playing with his son's fingers.

All three boys got a chuckle out of that, though none of this was improving Harry's mood at the lot of them ganging up on him in past and present.

Lily was smothering her own laughter now, finally distracted from eyeing James. Hermione, with her two male best friends, should know better than anyone what if felt like to explain these things

to them.

He should have made it seem like a drag Harry had to do this, he'd much rather spend all his time with Cho, but Hermione really had made him swear so he now had an obligation and to really make her feel as if she was more important by pleading with her to come along. It would have helped if he'd also mentioned how ugly Harry found Hermione.

"That is so unnecessary," Remus stated as he eyed Lily, "I'm sure she'd find it just as insulting his pandering to her need."

Lily just shrugged. She wasn't going to try speaking for Cho. She was privy to knowing what Harry had meant and so understood her son's position better than Cho likely had. Plus she'd never

had much insecurity in the man in her life, he'd never been secretive about his intentions. Yet at the same time, it was clear she was the only one in here who understood why Hermione had said it that way, it would have helped sooth Cho more than what Harry actually did.

"At least I could have told you that wouldn't have been helpful in the face of Cho," Sirius offered.

"Thank you Padfoot, I think I could have worked that one out," Harry rolled his eyes.

Hermione just laughed, saying he was as bad as Ron, or perhaps not she amended with a sigh,

All five of them couldn't help a soft snort of amusement at Hermione suffering her own plight of love.

"I'm guessing practice didn't go well," Remus said conversationally.

"I still can't imagine coming away from a practice in such a bad mood," James stated, his tone enough to state the idea was lost on him. "Quidditch is how you relieve stress."

"Dessert for dinner, that's got to be some consolation," Sirius chuckled.

"I love my wife," James needlessly declared as he grinned at her.

"I've never asked anything like this of you," Lily rolled her eyes at him.

"I know," he smirked as she made his point.

Harry just muttered something about he wasn't looking forward to a repeat, or if he had to, maybe he could sneak Hermione along under the cloak so it wouldn't go as bad again, or maybe Ginny if

she'd help him out in trade of getting her out of a Quidditch practice she so clearly hadn't wanted to be in...

"That would be a best seller," Sirius agreed.

"I love Ron just automatically took to the important part of that conversation," Remus snickered.

"That poor girl," James said with honest sympathy. He'd been lucky to have such a fantastic team his final year, yet every time Angelina turned something happened to hers this year.

Lily struggled to hold back a new wave of pig headed comments about the new mischief makers of this school, her restraint not helped at all by the sympathetic look growing on James.

"Ginny keeps getting better with every mentioning," Remus chuckled.

"Absolutely better than the little fan girl," Harry agreed full heartedly, even if he did look back on that with far more humor than he would have thought.

"He's so casual about having his stuff being nicked," Sirius grinned as well even if he knew he'd have gone off on Regulus for doing the same.

All four boys groaned and shifted restlessly, James wishing more and more someone would offer Ron some actual helpful advice rather than just complaining about the problem.

"That was true several months ago now," Sirius scoffed, "I've no clue why they stuck around after what Umbridge pulled, I haven't heard a lick of revenge from them about it."

"Sirius," Lily said in exasperation. "They've been at it this long, even if they don't care about the grades they may as well finish school by this point they're so close."

"I thought the reason they hadn't bailed was because they didn't want their mum to have more worries," Remus reminded. "That's hardly gone away, if not worse with their fathers recent injury."

Sirius turned back to the book in hopes the twins would give some better answer.

Harry burst out laughing that the closest thing to have crossed their minds in hear was his mother's words, and even she hadn't seemed that concerned about it.

James gave a loud applause at his son yet again helping out the twins, this time even unintentionally! Sirius though cracked up even harder as he realized it was Hermione who'd been the pin in this one, and wondered if anyone ever realized the connection.

"I want to know what possessed them to put that in what they eat," Lily crinkled her nose.

"A bit brilliant though," Remus grinned, "considering the essence is to help ease sore skin, and I can't think of a place they were more sore. If they'd put it on those boils, and realized it made them go away, then the next step would be adding it to their batch."

Lily narrowed her eyes with worry in here that this idea clearly didn't bother a single one of them, there was a reason she cooked in this house.

"Kill him more like!" James scolded.

Sirius whooped with laughter and James even joined in that time with glee.

The boys looked properly scandalized at this, but Lily defended Hermione on this one. "I may not like the sport much either, but I think a few things could be altered to make it more bearable for those who aren't obsessed with it."

"Like?" James challenged, clearly already convinced she could offer nothing for this.

"What if, instead of pinning the house teams against each other, any person from any house could be on four separate teams? Captains would still be chosen one from each house, and you'd have to create some structure for how each team got players so that nothing too dirty could be abused during selections, but it would do even more good to support a school unity rather than having another way for them to compete against each other. We already have the House Cup for that."

Her speculation ended there, for now, but she looked around and grinned further when she saw none of the boys were immediately dispelling the idea.

Sirius scrutinized her for an extra minute, but failing to come up with an argument against that, continued for now.

"Well she did say that to the three players who'd been booted off the team for something entirely not their fault," Sirius defended.

James opened and closed his mouth in outrage, and Harry was quite thankful his friend wasn't here now, or she may have gotten her ear chewed off.

Remus inhaled through his teeth as he watched his friends blanch at that spurn even through the book.

Harry would rather have jumped off the Astronomy Tower than admit it to her, but by the time he had watched the game the following Saturday he would have given any number of Galleons not to care about Quidditch either.

"I blame this on your father," Lily told him.

"It's half Ron's fault," Remus said fairly, "he got Harry into the details of it."

"No," James shook his head to try and distract himself from his own disappointment, "I take full responsibility for this."

"I'm going with that last one," Sirius said critically.

"I'm crying on the inside just hearing about it," James moaned at the display.

All four boys simultaneously ground at the idea so many goals had been made, but tried to cheer slightly Ginny had pulled that off! Harry in particular found it a novelty at all to be watching a

game from his school and with his disappointment still had far more fun watching Ginny play his usual position than he would have thought.

"I can easily imagine," James hung his head in agreement, he couldn't claim his team had won every game either.

"She shouldn't downplay her own win," Harry rolled his eyes.

"Like you would have done," Sirius snorted, which Harry failed to answer.

"How did you need her to remind you of that," James shivered, "it's the only thing getting me through these."

"Really James? The only thing eh?" Lily demanded of him.

He denied answer, even if he wouldn't take his comment back.

Harry had a very bemused smile in place the others all put down to him trying not to remember something about whether this happened or not.

"Credit to her then," James agreed with enthusiasm, though Remus shook his head in a bit of pity as well, at some point that must feel as much like a punishment as encouragement.

"I can't wrap my head around the fact that somehow banning the teachers from virtually talking to the students was okay, but not this song!" Lily seethed.

"It's really no fun if they're so despondent they won't react," Sirius agreed, Lily scrunching up her face at him as she thought he was entirely missing the point of not picking on someone when they were down.

"I'm sure he appreciates your restraint," Remus said deadpan, while Harry felt a nasty prickling feeling wondering why he couldn't remember Fred doing that again.

"There's a proper mate," Remus said in understanding, before unbidden the idea of which one of his friend were more like that, and it wasn't the two in the room. He blasted that idea away quickly before it could poison more of his life.

"He really is getting as conceded as you, at least about this sport," Lily snipped at her husband, before properly scolding Harry, "you don't know what you would have done in that moment as

well, you've hesitated over the Snitch before so the other Seeker wouldn't come in as well. You might not have even seen it from where you were, you were in a different angle in the stands."

Harry did look a bit abashed at his moment, he'd never want to undermine what Ginny had done.

"And we snuck down and pitched her head first to the ground below. After setting a teacher on fire, this was nothing!" Sirius kept going with absolute conviction as if reading.

"Technically Hermione did that," Harry pouted, "and you're never going to let that one go, are you?"

"No," all four said at once.

Harry shook his head at all of them before continuing to address Sirius, "and you know perfectly well there was no such thing said in there, even Dumbledore couldn't stop me from getting Cruicio'd by her if we'd tried-" he abruptly stopped, as if his tongue had rolled into his head and he'd had no other choice from the sting of his mind warning him further.

Sirius ignored where Harry had stopped and kept going with a mutter of wishes.

"Oh yes, because that's so much better than what I said," Sirius snarled in outrage, wanting nothing more than to sick a wild dog on her already and make this problem go away.

"Have you once managed to do that?" Lily asked, an edge of fear trying to push out her exasperation.

Harry denied answering, which was answer enough.

"I know that's what puts me to sleep every night," Sirius agreed with a smirk.

"There's something really interesting in there," Remus said with a raised brow.

"Yeah, how come you didn't mention her wearing a kilt along with those?" James smirked.

"I thought only blokes wore kilts?" Sirius corrected.

"It was the first Scottish thing that came to mind," he shrugged, "that and potatoes."

"It was a dream!" Harry protested this conversation before it could go further.

They frowned at him for ruining their fun, but since McGonagall wasn't here as their foyal, nor would they possibly have even dragged it out this far if she had been, he let it go.

Harry made a guttural noise of frustration at being reminded of this again! Days weren't even passing in here, he wasn't even having the frequent dream as his memory returned except the two

times so far, but as often as it was mentioned he may as well be.

Sirius couldn't deny he'd had a rising sense of interest at this new alteration to the dream, but it also made him quiver with unease just as much.

He glanced up at Harry shivering at his side, there was some unreadable look on his face Sirius was more convinced than ever he didn't really want to know.

Remus either didn't notice, or as usual was muttering for himself and didn't seem to realize others could hear. "Well this can't be good, sounded like Voldemort's getting closer to whatever this

thing is."

Sirius gave a heavy sigh in agreement before continuing loudly.

Sirius tried his best to hide his anger at this being true. He couldn't believe he was scared away from communicating with Harry! He'd even offered his pup another solution and the little birk had denied that out of some skewed idea he was protecting him! He wasn't even sure himself what it had been, but for Harry to clearly have just forgotten about it and not even bothered to check was maddening! He continued reading with far more hostility than a bit of mail should have offered.

"This isn't like what happened to Hermione last year is it?" Lily asked in concern, remembering the amounts of hate mail the poor dear got.

"Luna said the article wasn't even out yet for him to be getting any," Remus disagreed, though now Sirius felt even more justified in his haste of reading.

"Luna jumped ahead of schedule," James said with glee.

"Still not sure if I'm a fan of the rest of this showing up," Sirius said grumpily, eyeing the rest of the text with worry. If anyone had sent his godson a cursed letter, that meant Umbridge had let that through her screening of Harry's mail, and that wasn't going to go over well.

"That's a better reaction than you usually have to getting attention," Lily chuckled.

Remus scrunched up his face in agitation for that particular suggestion, Harry was tortured enough thank you.

"Everybody wants to put their opinion out there, even if it isn't an actual opinion," Sirius said in an attempt at Remus' wise voice.

Remus rolled his eyes for his friends attempt.

"Err," James said with concerned curiosity.

"I never got to see the picture," Harry answered with that bemused expression lingering in here, so he had no clue if Ron's reaction was to be a good thing or bad for that.

"He sent out a request for toad repellent, he still didn't get enough," Remus said with a straight face.

Lily bite down so hard on her tongue from shouting out in frustration for the grounds of this her eyes began welling up in pain. She could never stand the idea of that woman anywhere near

Harry, never mind the casual way she dished out torture and no on in that school had done a thing to stop it!

"I've yet seen your instincts fail you," Remus said blandly, "so I wouldn't be surprised if you were right." It made none of them feel better this treatment was being continued as casually as

Umbridge's.

Sirius let out a triumphant bark of laughter, everyone else getting a giggle out of that as well.

The three Marauders blanched in further outrage from that pond scum. The detentions were still worse, but if there was one thing she could do to strike them hardest, it was ban them from their

home turf. She grew luckier by the page they weren't there in person to teach her a thing or two about how she was treating their boy.

"Yes, how dare he have a voice in saying what happened to him that doesn't conform to you," James said dangerously, that smile still in place turning eerie as he thought of yet more curses he

planned on using on her someday soon.

Harry let out a low whistle even if his face was bland while he stated, "whoever would have imagined Umbridge would do me a favor in getting me out of an Occlumency lesson."

"This isn't funny Harry," James said flatly, his voice flat and his eyes flashing.

Harry raised his hands in surrender at once, wincing and regretting trying to make it funny even if in his own head he was still weighing the two on levels of awful and couldn't quite decide which was worse.

Lily felt her mouth flop open in true resignation of the stupidity of these. How did they manage to keep getting more ridiculous with every one?!

The boys were so sick of these being made up on the spot and being passed as actual laws they'd even run out of insults for them, something they wouldn't have believed possible before.

"What do you mean, for some reason?" Remus asked Harry, he found the woman's own idiocy almost brilliant.

"Everyone already thinks I'm a nutter, and just cause I said something in a paper wouldn't really change that," Harry said, his spirits clearly hadn't kept hold of that warmth pushing back at the Ministry this had originally given him. "Now there's no way anyone's going to risk getting expelled just to hear my account of being a madman even more."

"Oh Harry," Sirius chuckled, while James shook his head affectionately. "You have no idea what Umbridge just did."

Harry continued to just look around at them, but Sirius kept going before Lily could explain like she was clearly fixing to.

Harry still didn't seem to get it, and was opening his mouth to interrupt again to say so, so Lily did state, "remember back to your first week, how you suspected everyone was talking about your first detention in hopes you'd start shouting at them as well?"

He didn't have to think long before the realization hit, and he nodded as she finished, "they do want to hear you, it's far easier to form an opinion of a first hand account rather than what Dumbledore said. I'm not promising it will change everyone's minds, but those letters you were sent was the perfect example of how this will put things inside school as well."

Harry suddenly turned eagerly back to Sirius now, hope finally filtering through every bit of him! Umbridge had managed to take away yet one more thing about school he loved, now had he managed to circle back around to being banned from Hogsmeade again. In return, she may have gifted him with his best weapon yet in spreading his story for him.

"There's evidence as if we needed it," Sirius snickered.

It was amazing to finally see him smiling in here, practically glowing. The idea of what he'd been put through this year had weighed on him for so long they'd hardly been able to recognize it until it was being lifted away before their eyes. Finally, something had gone right for Harry, and no one, not even Umbridge was taking that away.

All four of them already had that flippant smile set in place, one Harry had grown to associate with their idea they'd never be caught by the teachers of that school. The lot of them weren't long from their own teen years and hiding things from anyone and everyone, and they couldn't wait to see how others were doing the same.

"Passable," Sirius said reasonably.

"Sometimes subtler can be safest," Remus shrugged.

"I never thought the idiocy of that one could be passed, could I please stop being proven wrong," James rolled his eyes.

"My favorite thing that teacher's ever done," Sirius chuckled.

Lily giggled affectionately for her old favorite teacher.

All five of them got a crack out of that one. They seemed to forget a lot how much fun Trelawney could be and enjoyed the reminders.

"Was, that an apology, or...?" James trailed off with a furrowed brow.

"She was holding his hand, I'll take that as a sign of forgiveness for meeting up with other girls," Sirius rolled his eyes at the girls further dramatics.

Harry had a soft smile in place, he was happy he'd found some more even ground with her, and they all wondered if they'd been dead wrong at the end of Harry's first date. Maybe he and Cho

did make up and further on from there.

Lily couldn't help a further smattering of giggles, all boys considered crying a bad thing, even tears of joy.

Harry touched the spot on his cheek, his smile growing more as his face took on another tinge of red, and for once he could easily ignore the snickers of those around him. He could still feel something for Cho, and though it didn't feel nearly as powerful as he thought it would if he'd married her, perhaps his full memories just hadn't been returned yet and he'd have even more happy memories of sharing time with her.

"Finally!" Remus said in relief. It hadn't exactly been a major drama, but it was still boggling the idea one of Harry's roommates had taken so long to believe Harry. Even not being close friends, Seamus really would have been expected to be one of those who'd know better.

"It's a start," Sirius raised a brow at that.

"I accepted it," Harry said agreeably, that smile was finally so carefree in here, they were all still smiling as well.

Lily smiled grimly to herself, beyond pleased as she realized they now had names for all of Voldemort's inner circle. There were still more out there, there would always be more Death

Eaters, but if she could find one good thing in the throes of these wretched things happening to her son, it was the justice those vermin would get.

James pumped his fist in triumph while Sirius cackled, all five of them beyond words at this level of comeuppance.

"Imagine that," Remus said dryly with a friendly chuckle.

"Miracles," Sirius almost managed with a straight face.

All four boys got yet more laughter out of this, though Lily thought that was pushing it just a touch too far. Umbridge hadn't yet, but she half feared at this point the woman would show up

and give the whole house detention.

"I'm actually quite confident it would still be amusing," James corrected, thinking of some clever things he could do if he figured out the timing of those words.

Lily didn't argue the point even as she watched his calculating look with exasperation.

They hated how short lived Harry's happiness was, but before their eyes they saw he was already starting to twitch with unease again, rubbing at his scar, his eyes taking on that glazed look of pain all over again.

Lily shivered down to her bone even before Sirius could catch his breath to keep going. Harry hadn't stopped rubbing his scar in here since it was mentioned, and he was looking just as sick as described. She wanted to make Sirius stop, to go get him a cold press for his forehead if that helped him even for a second, but she knew the truth, she was just delaying. They could all feel it

was happening again, Harry's fingers trembling and him pulling into himself as some new terrible memory was resurfacing, and the faster they pushed through it the better.

Sirius hung his head, shook it for a moment in agitation for having to be right about this, and then took a very long, deep breath before reading the latest travesty of Harry's life in having to see what Voldemort was up to. It was lost on no one this was yet another level of advanced, Harry now seeing directly into Voldemort's mind, the only thing that could be said was at least Harry hadn't been awake as well, he'd fallen asleep, so there was some consistency in this. Even that smallest moment of understanding and knowing one thing about this was of the vaguest comfort.

Sirius looked wildly around, and waited very impatiently for Harry to meet his eyes. He didn't quite manage it, looking more above his left ear, but Sirius said with such determination, that

Harry felt he had no choice but to look him full on, "that is not you!"

Harry had no response for that, but clearly Sirius wasn't doing a thing until he got something, so Harry gave a wobbly nod to his head.

Sirius twitched harshly again at having to say that, Harry half expected him to chew off his tongue in frustration, but thankfully he didn't call Harry on it again, they all knew it was only in Harry's mind so that would be how he'd describe it.

Remus could feel the usefulness of this information relating to a past event they'd heard about, but for now he was far more concerned hearing Harry wake up already and filed it all away. Unless Voldemort was going to be revealing his mortal weakness, seeing Harry in such intense pain from remembering this would never be worth it.

Harry whispered for Rookwood to take to his feet, and the man was in such haste to do so he nearly fell to the floor again. Even having accomplished this, he still stayed stooped, as if terrified to meet Harry's face.

James felt a disgusted taste lingering in his mouth at such an act he could never comprehend. Such proud Death Eater's treating any man like this was beyond him.

Sirius closed his eyes in blessing that was finally over, his grey eyes looked ready to shatter as he looked back to Harry with more concern than he ever had for anyone in his life.

Harry wasn't looking at any of them, his eyes tight shut and his jaw aching from clenching it so hard to stop his own scream. He hated these visions, hated how they kept inexplicably reminding

him of this connection to Voldemort he had no control over, but most of all he couldn't stand to look at his parents while they were happening. The monster that had cut their life short, and Harry kept reminding them of it all happening just by continuing to live.

Inexplicably, they refused to think the same. That was the only explanation for Lily saying in a tone he could have easily found in Molly Weasley, "Harry love, we should take a break."

He opened his eyes slowly, breathing steadily through his nose to find the pair huddled into each other with, well him in their lap. Maybe they just couldn't disconnect the two from the infant

who'd done nothing to the life he was cursed to live dragging everyone else around him with.

"No," he whispered, still unable to look at any of them, how his dad and friends were probably trying to stop themselves laughing silly at how he had to fight back tears every time this happened,

wondering when Ron would start accusing him of the boy who cried wolf as it seemed he couldn't go any length of time without panicking over something. "No, I just want to," he gestured vaguely back at his stupid biography, trying to grasp hold of anything to take away these poisonous thoughts from himself. He felt like a curse, any managing of happiness seemed destined to be dragged back into the reminder of how quickly he could lose all of it.

Sirius couldn't make himself immediately keep going, sick with worry as everyone else for just what was going through Harry's head. At least no one he'd cared about had been attacked this

time, but for a reason his godson could not explain, the more frequent these visions, the more Harry seemed convinced his life was going to end in ruin. He couldn't imagine how these could

continue to get worse, but surely if they were to get better he wouldn't be treating these like a death omen.

Remus had to nudge him hard to get his attention before whispering in his ear, "we can only help by continuing, that's proven to work already, don't let him dwell on whatever he's blaming himself for."

Sirius gave a jerky nod of agreement, fighting past blurry vision for the print again rather than focusing on his distraught godson.

Not one of them could blame Ron for this assumption, they would have thought the same if they hadn't knowledge of what it had been.

Harry shivered, his seat the only thing keeping him upright. He couldn't understand how Ron had never looked at him with revulsion like he felt for himself during this. Yet he'd found it no more in Ron's face than any of those around him. He wanted to believe that meant something, but he was too stuck in his own pit to grasp anything else except how much worse this was all going to get before these stopped, if they ever did.

Sirius at least looked a little quailed from his earlier outburst. Harry wasn't even referring to Voldemort by name, he was trying to put some distance into what he'd just witnessed. Harry could never really think he had more to do with Voldemort other than the constant...bother he was in Harry's life.

That feeling of significance from before settled on all of them now, Ron and Harry working this out for them feeling like just a little weight had been pushed away so they wouldn't have to

immediately speak of it again while in here. Sirius wished he could be closer to done with this already, he wanted to force Harry to take a break from all of this, but he seemed determined now. Any time Sirius stopped for too long or glanced towards the kitchen, Harry actually would meet his eyes. They were too hard, a distance in them he seemed unable to beat away, but he could still look at Sirius with an expression clearly saying he wanted past this and the only way to do that was for him to keep going.

"Priorities," James managed to say. It came out far too high pitched, but Harry gave him credit for trying when he still couldn't stop rubbing at a scar that wasn't even paining him in here, only in his memories.

Both Sirius and Remus flinched like Harry had tried to curse them. In this future of trying to convince him he needed to stop these, now Harry had clearly convinced himself more than ever

he should be keeping all of this to himself rather than asking for help.

James noticed, and said firmly, "Harry couldn't have told you even if he'd wanted to, there's no way he could get a note like that out." He finished internally he didn't even blame Harry at this point for not wanting to tell anyone else like Dumbledore. If the man couldn't be bothered to explain his actions towards ignoring Harry's existence than his son certainly shouldn't force

himself to be in his company.

Sirius had looked just a bit better at James' reminder, but it was both of some comfort Harry hadn't meant him, and also just a touch more hurtful he hadn't crossed his mind in wanting to say

something about this.

Lily made a high pitched noise of concern, her infant in her lap making some fussing noises at his mother's distress. She spent several moments just crooning to him it was all going to be alright while watching her elder child, who was watching back a look she couldn't place.

"This really is all making a disturbing amount of sense," Remus grumbled, this wasn't helping with their hole trying to change the subject thing. Of course it was a good thing Harry was finally getting some answers, it was absolutely fascinating one scrap of information and Hermione was putting all of this together so easily and saving them from false theories that would only hurt Harry in their speculation.

"Oh Merlin," Lily sighed as that was crammed down their throats. As if the Order wasn't suffering enough these days. They supposed if they'd thought about this one after the last revelation of

where the weapon was being hidden they would have put this together, but considering all the terrible things they'd been trying to keep track of while also trying to keep Harry's mind off of them, it was almost a relief Hermione putting this for them.

Harry had hated his premonitions from the very beginning, almost afraid of this knowledge in his head he couldn't access in knowing these answers, and somehow the worst of all was the feeling he was getting for who it was that would be sent for this.

"Well he's hardly been given a suitable way not to," Sirius scowled for her sudden change.

Lily frowned deeply, wishing Severus had given something more useful to Harry than the same repetitive advice that clearly wasn't being of much help.

"It's almost hurtful she thinks I'm not," Harry grumbled, shaking his head and honestly wishing this whole thing would quite being mentioned lately.

"The first good thing that man's ever done," Remus groused, Harry's mood feeling like an infection. They hadn't kept him smiling for a whole chapter before his high anger was pushing

them all back on edge.

All four of them could be seen rolling their eyes as Hermione continued to act more like a paranoid parent than anything, it wasn't soothing any nerves she couldn't be of any more help than

Snape with anything to say other than more practice at something that was just casing Harry pain.

Sirius chewed on the inside of his cheek unhappily for a moment, but was all the more agitated he couldn't come up with anything to tell Harry either except more transparent hope.

"Oh because that's really going to make me feel better," James said bitterly, fighting back the urge more every moment to walk out of the room and find something to curse.

"Err," Remus began, unsure if he wanted an explanation or it would only make things worse.

"I was eight," Harry began prattling off just for the sudden possession of not having to think about magic for a moment, who ever would have thought being bullied by Dudley would be considered a simpler time for him. "Petunia had just got done cleaning the bathrooms, and Dudley was bored so he wanted to see her yell at me. He tried to pick me up and put me in so I'd have to walk around the house with wet feet. That's where the memory ended for Snape," he finished, but continued on even though he didn't really want to, Remus had been right the first time, this

probably wasn't going to make them feel better. "I bit Dudley so I wouldn't go in though, and then I ran out of the house till I came back near dinner, which I was denied and locked in my cupboard for because Vernon said the the teeth marks were still there. He told Dudley to bite me back, but he didn't want to because he said it was gross. So I said back I thought I should spend the night in the bathroom, I'd already been throwing up all day from nicking him."

He finished and looked around at them again, expecting to see yet more anger or something, but instead he saw an almost proud smirk from James. "Always love hearing you gave them hell back."

Harry managed an honest grin at him, hoping he'd return the favor by telling him some story from his youth again, and James happily provided. "Reminds me of the time Sirius bit Remus, and we

got into this whole argument about what would happen if a werewolf bit a person while he was still human."

Harry busted out laughing more from surprise than anything as he demanded the obvious from his godfather, "why did you bite him?"

"I told him if he took one more of my sugar quills I would," Sirius shrugged, "he clearly didn't take me Siriusly."

Harry doubled up laughing all the harder while Remus rolled his eyes at the lot of them and tried to take the book away from Sirius to keep going. Sirius bared his teeth, Remus rolled his eyes harder, but Sirius kept going.

"I'm disturbed he's parted wisdom on you," James tisked even as he approved of this.

"He has a very vivid imagination," Sirius snarked.

"As opposed to counting your friends again?" Remus smirked.

"All none of them," Sirius agreed.

Lily frowned lightly at them, and James who wasn't bothering to repress a smile. She may be angry at Snape for treating Harry the way he was, but she still knew she'd never devolve into such

petty insults.

"That went without saying," James groused, Lily's eyes flashing in agitation again at once. Even for the one second she'd wanted to defend him it was gone again as he continued insulting her boy

who in no way deserved it.

Sirius cocked his head to the side, some amusement for Harry snapping at him in there, but mostly wanting to make the jab Harry could do Snape's job and they wouldn't need the man around at all. It was all lost though before he'd even formed the idea, he still didn't want Harry having to deal with this, let Snape take the risk.

"You impressed him," Lily said, narrowing her eyes curiously at such a response.

"I think I'm going to faint," James declared, they all looked astounded Snape hadn't just told Harry to shut his mouth again.

"Oh dear," Lily turned flat white in shock, but she hadn't a second to say anything even if she could have hazard a guess what this would do.

She wasn't sure if Sirius just didn't care, or didn't know what that would do, but by the time he'd realized it, he'd simply kept going until he ran out before looking around at his friends with a contemplative look on his face.

"Well, err, I recognized that last one," Remus said awkwardly for Harry. "That was Mary Shilling laughing anyways, our flying practice during first year."

Harry hardly heard him, the same stunned look on his face as the rest of the boys, before they all looked to Lily, who sighed deeply. "I'm not telling you, it's private." She said flatly without looking at any of them.

The fact that she knew what that first memory was about somehow made it even more awkward for them. Still, Sirius turned back with the same look on his face he always did when reading

about Snape, he didn't consider how a parent treated you any excuse for what the guy kept doing to Harry.

"And now we see why," James muttered, his eyes still narrowed as he thought back to many insults he'd made in the past, and actually feeling a little bad for a few of them. He knew Snape

would never do the same though, Snape knew everything Harry had gone through in his life and continued to treat him the exact same way.

Lily had a hard time swallowing for a moment, stinging tears in her own eyes as vivid memories from her own childhood resurfaced. Realizing he'd run to her house in the dead of night and throwing rocks at her window until she came sneaking down. The two staying up in their little grove till sunrise wishing there was some escape from those who hated them. At least her own parents had been a bridge between her and her sister, and she'd tried to be that for Sev and his parents, but it had never truly worked, and she'd never even bothered to find out if it got better after she'd stopped speaking to him. She blinked back into the room to find James with his arm tight around her, brushing at the baby's hair and actually holding his tongue against whatever that look meant until she nodded to Sirius to keep going.

Sirius ground his teeth together hard in frustration for that. Harry was about to be punished again for something from Snape's past.

Harry gasped wildly, startling so bad he nearly fell out of his seat. Sirius glanced to him in concern, then looked to the others for some sort of explanation. They all looked just as stunned

though, unable to understand what was happening here.

"Harry's never been this far before, and Voldemort shouldn't have either!" Lily protested what she was hearing vehemently. "No one should be seeing this!"

"Maybe, maybe Rookwood has though," James ruffled up his brow as he considered the latest Voldemort news. "He worked in this place, right? So he would have shown Voldemort everything he'd seen, and now, now Harry knows as well," he finished sounding just as confused as when he'd started.

"Should it really work like that though?" Harry sounded just as panicky as his mother. "I don't want to know this, see this! I don't want all of his memories and anything he knows in my head!"

He sounded so desperate and panicky by the end, it truly broke the others hearts to see him like this.

"Oh Harry," Lily pleaded, letting the words tumble out on pure instinct. "You can't keep thinking like that-"

"How else am I supposed to think when it keeps being shoved at me!" He snapped back, but Lily wouldn't be deterred.

"You remind yourself why you're doing this! If you want Voldemort out of your head, then you work on every available way to do that! You're worried Voldemort's taking over your life then

you remind yourself of all the people who are on your side and fighting to get rid of him!"

Harry kept watching her like he hoped she'd keep going, but she met his eyes and waited as they ebbed back into that calm, that understanding that had pushed him to cope with every terrible

thing he'd relearned while here.

She nodded fiercely and waved Sirius on. It seemed to take him a moment, to watch the fifteen year old girl crying over the loss of her childhood friend be flipped into that mother who refused to see her child fall into the same hopeless feeling. He went back to reading with a smile of pride on his face.

Harry couldn't believe how grateful he actually felt towards Snape for stopping this. It was the first time in his life he looked past the hateful potions teacher and knew Snape could actually be of some help to his life if he'd quit insulting him every step along the way.

Harry rubbed at where the lump used to be, suddenly more ashamed than ever for is poor Occlumency skills. His mother was right, and so was Snape, he'd never really tried to do this. It

was of some comfort to him his father and friends rolled their eyes for Snape's jab, that they weren't blaming Harry for this...yet. He pulled away from that at once, there would never be a time they'd blame him because of whatever this connection was, right?!

Sirius startled so bad he nearly dropped the book from surprise. Then he cast his mind out before anyone could get too panicky, and said the first thing that came to mind. "Finally, something

entertaining is happening around there!"

Remus gave him a look of great concern as he demanded, "just what could a scream be used for as a good thing?"

"For shame Moony!" Sirius wagged his finger in his face. "Scream of surprise, scream of delight, hell even screaming in laughter! Don't get so dower on me a scream is only a bad thing now."

"I worry about him," Lily told James in an almost conversational tone of voice.

James agreed, but instead he told him, "well get on with it then, or we'll be spending the next hour with you recanting the last time you made a girl scream, and no one wants to hear that again."

Sirius rolled his eyes but complied anyways.

"Someone standing in the middle of the school screaming? Oh yea, just slipped my mind," Remus rolled his eyes.

"I'm not even sure why you hesitated," James scoffed.

Lily felt goosebumps erupt on her at this. If whatever was happening was upsetting McGonagall, but she wasn't stepping in, then what the bloody hell could be happening!?

"What in the world..." Remus tried, and failed, but the shock was keeping them all from saying much of anything, Sirius hurrying through words so fast they were mashing together. None of them had a very fond feeling for Trelawney, but it was impossible to believe she was a spectacle without anyone stepping in to whatever mayhem this was!

"You have got to be kidding me!" Lily shrieked, the baby in her lap now fussing in his blankets in her lap. "That is, this isn't, how could she-" she forced herself to stop screaming because her child had joined in, but the anger wasn't being cooled one little bit.

"Why can't this stupid curse kick in early already," Remus scowled. "I want her gone well before the end of the year, like the staircase collapsing on her right now!"

Sirius was too shocked to keep going for a moment. Like Harry had said before, this had been forthcoming with how obvious it was Trelawney may not be around the rest of the year, but no

one could have foreseen such a brutal showing like this.

"Does she even have anywhere else to go?" Remus whispered. He really didn't know much about her except for her classes, but suddenly he wondered if she was like Hagrid, if she had no other

place to call home like a few of the other teachers did.

He hadn't expected an answer, and it was probably kinder he hadn't gotten one, no one wanted to consider the alternative.

"This is..." sick didn't begin to cover it, but James was failing to come up with another word. He'd never even seen some of the Death Eaters out there enjoy watching someone else in so much pain, in such a public way!

"How she dare!" Lily was still fired up over every detail of this. "Them! She's no right to put herself in line with anything to do with that school, with a decision no respectable person would ever dream of putting together!"

James was shaking his head in honest sympathy for the two. Though he couldn't imagine just standing around crying during this scene, he knew he would have been in Umbridge's face telling

her what's what about this even for a teacher he didn't like. The woman may have the audacity to kick a teacher out of his school, but she couldn't force that teacher to leave the premises...yet.

Then his mind offered one last desperate hope, where was Dumbledore? Surely he'd find some way to stop this? The idea was dashed as soon as it had appeared though, as Dumbledore hadn't

seemed to be doing much of anything these days.

Lily finally felt herself relaxing, just a touch, as she hummed with approval. McGonagall could always be counted on to offer up some comfort to those who needed it, she was still stunned it had

taken this long for their old Transfiguration teacher to step in for this injustice.

"I feel the need to reiterate the book now," Sirius beamed, "what an entrance."

Remus smacked him lightly and called him an idiot even as he was smiling as well. Finally Dumbledore's timing felt like it was back on their side.

"I'm afraid you've misplaced your soul, but I won't be the one getting it back from the dementor," Remus groused.

"Actually, I heard that if a dementor kissed her, she'd suck out its soul," James stated.

Sirius laughed, the first time he'd really been able to do so when mention of those things had come up.

"What's he got up his sleeve?" James demanded with sudden eagerness, his kindling of hope finally being given life again Dumbledore would pull through on making this actually somehow

better.

"Ha!" Sirius barked in triumph, all five of them seconds away from pumping the air in victory. "Dumbledore's not going to let Trelawney just walk away from this!"

Harry was still grinning along with the rest of them even as he distantly wondered if Dumbledore had some ulterior motive for this other than just proving a point to Umbridge. He wondered if he was growing paranoid, surely Dumbledore didn't have to have a second reason for doing everything.

"I love this place," Remus said wistfully. His best memories had been collected in those walls, and now he was adding another from a time outside his own. He'd never underestimated how lucky he

was to even be going there, to be treated like any other student on a daily basis, and now he was getting the fortune of watching the teachers band together for one of their own again. He didn't

even pity Umbridge, but continued waiting impatiently for that toad to be ostracized from such a place already, for daring to tamper with such a home for so many.

"You'd have to put her in that exact place eh?" Sirius said poisonously. "No other bloody room in that grand castle would be good enough, you also need to invade her room!"

"Dumbledore won't let her," James said with conviction once again, even this small win of Dumbledore's against Umbridge had finally restored his lacking faith in his old headmaster.

"He works fast," Lily said slowly as they all paused in confusion of this. Apparently this had all taken place in less than an hour, which means someone very close to the Minister must have

warned Dumbledore this was fixing to go down and the man acted lightning fast in getting a replacement set even before Umbridge had gotten the paper herself. It couldn't have been Percy, but they couldn't think of anyone else who'd know about this and been able to warn Dumbledore in time for him to go fetch, well whoever was getting the new job.

All three Marauders burst out laughing, a near euphoric mood at their headmaster pushing such a loophole into that dowey face!

Harry gave an awkward smile for this announcement amongst the shocked faces. His only memory of the centaur wasn't a particularly fond one even if his life had been saved by him.

"Well, who would have seen that coming?" Sirius blinked in surprise.

"This certainly is, unprecedented," Remus agreed as Sirius passed Harry the book, very obviously keeping it open for his spot with an obvious look at James who didn't get it.

Lily ignored the lot of them and though happy Trelawney got some kind of win out of this, couldn't help but say, "well considering he once saved Harry's life, let's at least hope he won't pick up on Trelawney's trend of telling Harry he's going to die."