A/N: as you may have noticed in the last chapter, I don't do well with serious writing. Elli pointed out one HUGE thing where I averted the attention from Lily's dead parents to something else: I did the cliché and cheesy line where Lily's all 'I suppose they're in a better place now', but then interrupts herself by saying 'besides, you have a Quidditch game today', and other things like that. I'm sorry, that's who I am. You'll see more of that in this chapter, extremely noticeable when Lily is talking to… uh, just read it before I give something away coughhellokittycough have fun!

The trio simultaneously raced into the room. James headed to check Lily's room, Missy the bathroom, and Sirius James's room. Lily's room startled the hell out of James. It was no longer scarlet and gold, but blood red and black. And white. White feathers of her lacerated duvet and exploded pillows covered everything. Things were overturned, anything breakable was shattered. It looked as if someone had gone mad in this room.

James backed out, still stunned. He went to the bathroom that Missy was searching. It was perfect, pristine. As was James's own bedroom. But where was Lily?

"Accio Marauder's map!" said Sirius, reading James's mind. (A/N: why does Sirius do that? First with Missy, now James. I mean, come one, is he a freaking psychic or something? Lol.) The map zoomed in, landing in Sirius's hand.

"This could take a while," sighed James. Missy grinned.

"Or not." She leaned close to the map and whispered, "Lily Arianna Evans."

A second later, neat print scrawled across the page, spelling: Not in the castle.

James and Sirius were wide-eyed. "How did it do that? We created this thing!" said Sirius. Missy grinned.

"Well, Lily and I knew about the Map, and we decided you boys were rather stupid for not magicing it to find a person for you. So, one night, we were bored, and decided to help you out a bit with your lovely project there. It needs a woman's touch. Won't answer to you boys."

"Okay, can we PLEASE get back to the subject here!" shouted James. "If Lily isn't in the castle, where is she? We've got to find her, especially if that blood's hers."

Missy leaned back down to the map. "Is Lily Arianna Evans on Hogwarts grounds?"

No.

Missy paled. "If she isn't in the castle, and she's not on the grounds…" she looked up. "Maybe we're reading this room wrong. What if Lily didn't wreck the room out of sorrow? What if it was a struggle?"

James turned as white as Nearly Headless Nick. "We've got to find Dumbledore."

"How are we going to explain the map?"

"Crap. We can tell him a graduating student gave it to us in our first year. He'll know the truth, but the won't push it."

"Alright," said Missy. Unfortunately, Dumbledore's office was on the other side of the castle. The three Quidditch players looked at each other. "ACCIO BROOMSTICK!" And sure enough, three broomsticks came zooming around the corner.

(A/N: wanna know what happened to Lily? Here it is)

Okay, so last we checked, Lily was clinging to her pillow for dear life. Right? Good, we're on the same track. The room swirled around Lily, making her feel as if she were on a demented Merry-Go-Round. She didn't see them at first because they blended into her newly black walls. Then she heard the voices.

"Yes, we've got her now," said one venomnous voice.

"The Dark Lord will be quite pleased with us," another voice hissed.

"Take her wand, it's right there," yet another voice commanded.

Lily grabbed her wand, which was sitting on her bedside table. The spinning of the room slowed down as she looked up. About seven masked and cloaked figures were gathered around her bed. It was hard to count because she was still dizzy. They all had wands pointing at her.

"Come, now."

"You will be taught magic beyond your wildest dreams, even though you are a mudblood."

"The Dark Lord wants you brought to him immediately."

"Put. The. Wand. Down."

"Who are you?" she asked, keeping her wand up.

"We are servants of the Dark Lord. We are going to take you to him."

"Like hell you are," she told them.

Lily shot every curse, hex, and jinx she knew at them. Of course, they threw everything short of the killing curse at her. Her room really was becoming quite trashed. Lily was dodging all sorts of spells. She ducked out of the room and into the common room, where this show resumed. She had been hit with a quite a few curses, and they hurt like hell. One opened a long gash on her leg, and the blood was dripping onto the floor. (A/N: ah, the mystery blood!)

Finally one of the figures hit her with the Crucaitus curse. Lily fell to the floor, writhing with a pain she knew all too well from her dreams. While she was down, another one hit her with a stunner.

(A/N: Shall I go on, or leave this insanely short chappie to bug you? Hmmm. Let's see… Guess you'll just have to find out, won't you?)

(A/N: here you go, thanks for being patient!)

Lily woke with the worst headache she'd ever had. Every muscle in her body throbbed. She had no idea where she was. She opened her eyes, and guess what she saw. Go on, guess. Yep, a ring of the masked and cloaked figures. They surrounded the walls of the circular dungeon she lay in the middle of. The floor was slick and shiny. It'd be difficult to run, and the cloaked people would surely catch her in a millisecond.

She lifted her pounding head and saw the bone white face and red eyes of her dreams. In her dreams, this thing had tortured her. She didn't know if she was about to, because she always woke up. This wasn't a dream. She wouldn't join him. He would kill her. Was she afraid? Hell yes. She was afraid of this murderous—thing. But if she died, she died for a good cause, and she'd be with her parents again. No, she was not afraid. She was angry, lonely, and shaking in her shoes, but she was not afraid.

Lily struggled to her feet, quite aware that she was wandless. Then she saw Voldemort had it. Goody. This should be interesting. She knew it wouldn't play out exactly as it did in her dreams, because in her dreams, she didn't know who this was. She did now.

"Mudblood, it is a great honor for you to so much as be in the Dark Lord's presence," said a cloaked figure. "Kneel before him."

Lily laughed outright. "How about…no."

Someone cast the Imperious curse on Lily. Lily had a lot of rage in her right now, and easily fought it off. Voldemort raised his hand for the man to stop.

"Do you know who I am?" he asked.

Lily suppressed the urge to shudder. "Lemme guess… What other murderous, evil, and dark beings are attempting to rule the world right now…? OH MY GOD IT'S HELLO KITTY!" she got some really odd looks. "Okay, maybe not. Oh, there was this one other guy, I just can't seem to remember his name," she taunted. "Voldywarts? Wartymold? Scumoftheearth? Oh, right, I've got it now, Voldemort!"

The cloaked figures hissed. "How dare you say the Dark Lord's name!"

"What, Hello Kitty?" again, odd looks. "Oh, right, Voldemort?" they hissed. "Volde-mort, Volde-mort, Volde-mort!" Lily chanted like a little girl.

"Stop!" said Voldemort, getting a headache. "Okay, if we could get back to where I tell you how I'm going to make you a dark witch and all?"

"Oh, right, sorry," said Lily. "Proceed."

"Thank you. Anyway, as I was saying, join me and have power beyond your imagination. You will be my heiress, the dark princess, even though you are a Mudblood."

Lily rolled her eyes, rather bored by this routine by now. "Normally, I'd get all offended and yell and scream at you not to call me that, but, whatever. I mean, I've heard that name so many times, I'd think the master of evil would have something better up his sleeve, so continue."

"Right, so, you WILL become a dark witch whose powers I control. I will use you for my own purposes, and you will become ALMOST as great as me."

"And if I don't want to join this happy little brigade?"

"You don't have a choice."

Lily laughed outright at him. "You'd be surprised, wouldn't you, but I do. I mean, I know what's going to happen. I say yeah, sure I'd love to be almighty and stuff, and you say goody, goody, then you torture me to make me evil. I say know and you torture me until I die. Not a whole lot of choice, but there's definitely a choice."

"Fine, you pigheaded little bitch. But in the end, you'll be screaming for death and mercy. They all do."

"Whatever. If we're going to do the whole pain thing, please get it over with." Lily was sweating; dreading the pain she knew would come.

"Become my heiress."

"No," was the gritted word.

Now Voldemort was just plain pissed. I mean, come on, this little 5'4" girl was outright refusing the master of evil. You'd be pissed too!

"Forsake the light and come to the dark side!"

"No," when Lily said this, she met his eyes.

"Crucio!"

Lily fell to the floor, writhing. It felt as if she were being stabbed by millions of daggers that burned with an icy fire. Tears flooded down her face. She couldn't take much more. And it stopped. She lay gasping like a fish out of water, unable to move, but managed to glance at her watch. A minute and a half of pain. Holy shit.

"Join me."

"No," she croaked. Damn the stubbornness of redheads!

Again, the pain washed over her in waves. She felt herself losing her grip. Her grip on why she was saying no, her grip on sanity, her grip on life. No, I will not give in. I will not give up. I'm going to survive this. It seemed like an eternity later, but the wracking pain stopped. Her nose was bleeding. Two minutes this time. By now Lily was wondering what the record survival time under the Crucaitus curse was. She had a bad feeling she was nearing it.

"I do not want to kill you, you are too useful to me. But I will do it. You have too much power for me to let you return to the light. If you don't join me, you will die."

"Don't… you… think…. I… know… that?" Lily gasped out.

"So, does your answer remain?"

Lily glared. "You're going to kill me no matter what I say bastard, so it doesn't really matter what my answer is, does it?"

"Ooh, a smart one. Too bad I do have to kill her. Oh well, there's more where she came from. Crucio!"

Go on, Lily. Just say it. Beg for mercy. He may still let you live. No he won't you know it. I'm not going to give him the satisfaction of begging. Just do it. Scream for mercy. He'll give it to you. Okay. NO. I can't go to the dark side. Oh come on, what's to lose? Nothing, I guess, my parents are dead. Because HE killed them! How can you be sure? The minister of magic is off his rocker, he may have just assumed it was Voldemort. You may be right. I mean, what HAVE I got to lose? Oh yeah. James. Missy. Sirius. Joan. Remus. What about them? What about them? They really have nothing to do with this. But they do. What will happen to them if I die? They'll go on with their happy little lives. Just let go. You can do it. Just let it all go. Okay.

Lily's schizophrenic conversation was ended abruptly. (A/N: yes, she was having a schizophrenic conversation. She WAS losing her grip on sanity, remember?) She started coughing up some sort of liquid. Amidst the pain-induced convulsions, Lily managed to turn over on her hands and knees, coughing and hacking. She opened her eyes to see that she was coughing up blood. Oh shit, that couldn't be good. But the pain was still going.

That's it, I'm through. She looked at her watch. THREE FREAKING MINUTES! I don't think any human could live through this much longer. Why should I? I knew you'd understand it eventually. We just can't win against something like this. No one can.And you were right. I was a fool for thinking I could overcome this.

As Lily closed her eyes for one last time (?), Voldemort's evil laugh rang through the chamber.

A/N: I know, that was mean. Another cliffie. I'm sorry, but I like to make sure you're coming back. grins evilly I can't help it! 'sides, I'm working on another fanfic right now. Told from the POV of an OC, James's best friend. Mwuahahahahahahahahahahahahaha! Anyway, did I screw with the future and kill Lily? You decide! Jk, I already know what's gonna happen. Sorry. R&R or I'll send my evil purple elephant after you!