Thank you for reading! I don't own any of Harry Potter! Please let me know if you enjoy! Updates every Saturday!
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Flowing, red rivers of young men's blood warmed the black night as the Second World War's terror continued unrelentingly through the spring of 1945.
In the sky somewhere between England and France, young Richard Evans grit his teeth as his hands clamped onto the steering knob while fiery explosions burst like bleeding memories into his peripheral vision around both sides of his aircraft.
The radio in the cockpit crackled as the sound of his brothers-in-arms tried desperately to warn him about the danger which his position left him powerless to defeat.
"Swing down, Evans!"
"They're on your tail!"
"Dive, man, dive!"
Richard turned his head to catch a glimpse of his evil, dark enemy, with its spinning, black propellers and shark-painted snout as it carried his doom straight towards him.
Acting on adrenaline, he pushed the black lever in the center of the console down, but it was too late.
From somewhere behind him, he heard a screeching, ominous blast ring out.
His plane jolted so violently with the impact that for a split second, he imagined that he had died from the force of the punishing shot.
Richard's eyes widened as the sickening sensation of falling fast and heavy took over.
He gasped for breath as he choked on billowing clouds of black smoke.
The scent of burning metal permeated the air while his plane accelerated in its tailspin towards the ocean below.
This was the moment, the harrowing confrontation with death that he and all of his fellow soldiers had trained for, the second that their fallen friends had already faced.
Richard closed his eyes as the wreckage of his plane hurtled towards the dark sea water at a horrifying speed.
His survival instincts reminded him to make an attempt to save himself, no matter how futile his efforts seemed.
While he fell, he murmured a prayer under his breath and freed himself from the belt on his seat.
As he coughed and sputtered, Richard cracked his eyes open in time to see the ocean.
He hurriedly grabbed one of the tools next to his leg and used it to smash the plane's small window.
In the crash, as soon as he saw the water rush towards him, he forced himself to slip out into the sea seconds before his plane exploded.
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Although the ocean was deceptively dark and frighteningly vast, Richard Evans wasn't alone in its depths.
Long, talon-covered fingers had twitched curiously as glowing, green orbs had watched the fiery wreckage slam into the water before something shot out of the metallic, burning hunk.
Those glowing, green orbs had flashed with excitement after they fell on the man who struggled to find his bearings under the sea.
Without hesitation, the creature that had watched Richard's plane fall into the ocean propelled itself from the sandy sea floor and began to approach.
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Richard Evans battled to rise to the surface as he grit his teeth from the pain caused by waving his injured limbs in the thick water.
He sank lower and lower as he fought.
The air in his battered lungs ran out as the water seeped in.
While memories from his short life flashed through his mind, he could have promised that he saw a glowing light in the middle of the dark sea.
A single glowing light…...no….two, actually.
Two sparkling emeralds gazed at Richard Evans just before his eyes rolled back into his head.
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Those two sparkling emeralds were the first thing that Richard Evans noticed when he opened his eyes again.
Music crackled on a radio nearby.
He blinked until he saw that he lay in a makeshift hospital, bandaged, broken, and sore, but alive…...somehow.
The woman who sat across from him, dressed in a nurse's uniform, had the reddest hair that he had ever seen.
Her tresses were like licking flames exacerbated by hot cinnamon.
Her emerald green eyes seemed almost unnaturally bright as she watched him carefully with her crimson lips pursed in worry.
Richard barely had the strength to glance over her figure, but from what he saw of her curves that were hidden behind her uniform, he concluded that the entirety of her form was surely beautiful.
"You must be an angel……" He croaked.
The gorgeous nurse smiled as she handed him a sip of water while she whispered, "I've never been called that before…..Easy, don't push yourself, you've got a long road ahead."
After facing death, still dazed from his ordeal and woozy from pain, Richard asked her bluntly, "I'm Second Lieutenant Richard Evans, I...After the war's over, will you go dancing with me?"
"Well, it's lovely to meet you at last, Second Lieutenant Richard Evans…...And I'd love to." The nurse smiled.
"What's your name?" Richard whispered as the nurse placed the cup of water back on the makeshift table next to his bed.
"Leucosia….I mean, um, Lucy….My name is Lucy." The nurse nodded quickly.
Leucosia, er, Lucy felt relieved that Richard had closed his eyes again.
It worried her that he may have noticed her careless mistake.
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The war ended three days later.
Upon his recovery, Richard Evans took Lucy out for a night of dancing.
One month later, they became Mr. and Mrs. Evans.
At Lucy's request, the couple moved to a distant fishing village on the far side of England and lived a quiet life there for twelve years.
Richard pursued fishing as a profession until a friend of his friend found him a better paying job in London shortly after Lucy fell pregnant.
The family moved to the suburbs of Cokeworth and Petunia Evans was born several months later.
On a chilly January morning, three years after Petunia's birth, Lily Evans arrived.
Richard couldn't understand why his wife wept so bitterly that day.
As Lucy studied her baby's tufts of bright, red hair and the stark vividness already present in her green eyes, she knew that her little girl would eventually belong to the sea, exactly as she did.
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A short distance away from the Evans' home, across the river, in the brick townhouses where the factory workers dwelt, another baby also entered the world in January of 1960.
Severus Snape came wailing into the cold afternoon as the unwanted son of Tobias and Eileen.
"At least it wasn't twins." Tobias said with a nonchalant shrug after he inspected his newborn while the midwife packed up her supplies.
Eileen sat on the bed, still flushed from her labour.
She cradled little Severus against her breasts as he whimpered.
"This was as much your fault as it was mine!" Eileen snapped at her husband.
"And how do you figure that?!" Tobias hissed. The gruffness of his voice earned a frightened whine from Severus as he roared, "Your….people…..should have known how to prevent this!"
"Well, he's here now!" Eileen cried.
"Aye," Tobias snorted before he stood and traipsed out of the room, "...He's here now."
As baby Severus blinked up at his mother, she smiled down tiredly at her newborn.
"Don't listen to him, my darling." Eileen whispered as she bent down and kissed the top of her baby's head, which was already covered in black hair, "Mummy loves you very much and that's a good thing, yes?...Love is what you need in this life. Don't ever forget that, my handsome boy."
Severus cooed as Eileen gently kissed his tiny head once more.
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Although their homes stood incredibly close to one another, Severus Snape grew up worlds apart from Lily Evans.
Severus had been raised dirty, poor, and frightened, with his mother as his only respite.
Sometimes after a particularly difficult day, Eileen would hold her son in her arms and use her low, silky voice to sing him to sleep.
While she soothed Severus, he would cuddle against her and dream of more pleasant things.
Oppositely, Lily had been raised in a home full of love and light.
She had grown up happy, healthy, and fortunate enough to have all that she wanted of everything; food, a soft bed, clothes that fit, a clean living area, parents who cared for her, and an older sister who often doubled as a playmate.
As Lily had aged, it had become noticeable that she and Petunia had many differences.
Lily could do things that her sister only dreamed of, much to Petunia's dismay, and their parents' joy.
The Evans sisters found that their friendship became tested by bitter jealousy as time went by.
During the spring that followed Lily's ninth birthday, she and Petunia engaged in their first full blown argument over the issue while they stood on the riverbank behind their home.
Earlier that day, Lily had helped her mother bake a cake without touching anything at all.
Her family had watched while the ingredients had flown around the kitchen at her silent command.
Richard had been awed.
Lucy had worn a proud smirk.
Petunia had been furious.
"How did you do it?!" She demanded as she faced her younger sister.
"I already told you!" Lily exclaimed with a shrug, "I don't know how I did it! I just imagined that I wanted the cake to be baked and…..and everything started to move, Tuney!"
The girls were so focused on each other that neither of them heard the grass rustle on the other side of the river.
Severus Snape had become a quiet, lonely child.
Only three weeks older than Lily, he often played outside in an effort to escape his depressing surroundings and enjoy a reprieve from his parents' terrifying shouting matches.
Sometimes he wandered out of the small backyard behind the Snapes' brick townhouse.
He came to the riverbank on occasion, but since he had discovered the little red-headed girl on the other side, his visits had increased in frequency.
From the edge of his backyard that day, Severus had heard the Evans girls' shouting match and that's what had drawn him to the riverside.
Not the argument, but the red-headed girl.
At last, he had heard her voice!
Severus smiled to himself as he stood next to the river, hidden by the bushes, and listened to the red-headed girl speak.
She sounded as lovely as he had dreamed.
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"I'm the eldest! They should be prouder of me than they are of you!" Petunia hissed hatefully at her sister.
Lily scowled as she prepared to respond but before she could, Petunia shrieked, "You're just…..weird….that's all! You're just weird! You'll get over it…...Mum and Dad will too!"
Petunia snarled at Lily, turned, and stalked back up the hill that led to their house.
Lily frowned as she called out mournfully, "...Tuney!...Wait!"
As Petunia walked away, the sound of crunching grass on the other side of the riverbank became noticeably apparent.
Lily whirled around to investigate the noise.
Severus had only meant to shift on his feet but he realized that he had been caught when the red-headed girl stared straight into the bushes that concealed him.
"Hello?..." Lily called out anxiously, "Is…….Is anyone there?"
Her red hair waved in the breeze that blew past as she blinked and scanned over the river.
Severus took a deep breath while he gathered his courage.
He tried not to tremble as he stepped out from the bushes and walked plainly into the red-headed girl's sight.
As he gazed at her clearly, he admired how much prettier she looked without the green leaves of the river's bushes hanging in front of his eyes.
Vibrant, Severus thought the red-headed girl was vibrant, and he loved her for it.
He needed something as light and as bright as her to break up the murky chalk of his dismal world.
As Lily watched him with a frown, Severus's first instinct was to feel self-conscious about his mismatched clothes, but he remembered that he was a stranger to her.
He hastily sought to rectify that.
Lily watched as the dark-haired boy across the riverbank bent down and plucked a single, green stem from the earth.
She watched as the stem stood straight up in his palm once he opened his pale hand.
Severus's dark eyes softened as he looked at the red-headed girl.
Lily laughed as that little green stem flew into the air, over the river, and landed in her own palm as she gladly extended her arm.
"I'm Severus." He introduced himself.
It surprised him that he had found the words, but the red-headed girl inspired him to overcome his inhibitions.
As they stood there, he wanted very badly to gain her friendship.
"I'm Lily!" The red-headed girl exclaimed with a grin.
Severus managed a small smile as he nodded at her.
Lily walked closer towards him until they stood on the opposite edges of the river.
"Do you live nearby?" Lily asked.
"Just up the hill." Severus explained as he pointed behind himself, "...Do you?"
"Just up the hill!" Lily laughed as she pointed behind herself.
Lily didn't know how to explain it, but as she looked into Severus's black eyes, she could tell that something had hurt him.
A strange, new desire to take away that pain and keep him for herself suddenly threatened to overcome her.
She batted away those uncomfortable thoughts as she smiled brightly and spoke, "There's a bridge down that way." She explained as she pointed to the left, "Would you like to play together, Sev?"
"Yes, Lily." Severus nodded, "I'd like that very much."
As young Severus and Lily walked side by side down the riverbank to reach the bridge and complete the beginning of their friendship, they had no idea of the bond that would exist between them or the magnitudinous ramifications that their eventual union would generate.
