*Warning* This chapter is where the 'fic really starts to earn its PG-13 rating. Maybe even leaning toward R. So, If you're offended by violence, blood, and/or suicide, be warned.

Scared you now, haven't I?

But really, this is where its going to be getting a bit more serious, and you might even get some answers soon. Maybe. *hides from readers who hate shameless teasing*

***

As Kerri fumed her way out of the castle, she nearly collided with Harry, Ron, and Hermione at the gate. Hands on hips, she glared at them, anger still replacing her fear. "Why is it I run into you three every time I wish to be alone? Gods, I swear, the only beings in this castle more irritating than you are Professor Snape and Peeves!"

The younger children blinked at her for a moment, stunned by her outburst, before Ron piped up, "Don't forget Professor Trelawny."

The corner of Kerri's mouth twitched. "I haven't had the pleasure of encountering that particular teacher yet. I was going to go see Hagrid before our unceremonious meeting."

"Well, what do you know. We were just going there ourselves." Hermione laid a hand on her shoulder.

"What a fascinating coincidence." Kerri commented dryly. "I shall have to mark this on my calendars."

Ron shuddered as he and Harry steered her out the door, Hermione trailing behind. "You definitely need to get out more. You're even starting to sound like Snape."

Kerri suppressed her own involuntary shudder of rage and glared at the boy. "If you ever say that again, I shall have to feed you to my cats."

"Ho hum, another death threat," grinned Harry. "You'll have to stand in line, I'm afraid."

"Well, I'm sure by the time it's my turn, you will have given me ample time to come up with a reason to throttle you." She couldn't help but shyly return the grin.

Ron halted in his tracks, studied her face carefully, and then let out a victorious whoop, pointing at the grin. "See? See? I told you she could smile! Told ya she was human! Pay up, Harry!"

Pay up . . . ? As Ron began skipping in circles, Kerri pulled Hermione aside. "You wouldn't happen to know the terms of this bet, would you?"

Hermione rolled her eyes. "Well, Ron said that he'd seen you smile before, and Harry didn't believe him. So they made a bet on it to see if you ever smiled again."

"Oh, they did, did they?" I didn't realize I was that bad at it . . . She turned on Harry. "And what was this part about being human?"

Harry looked sheepish. "Um . . well . . . I . . . er . . . I bet Ron that you were actually a golem."

"A gol-! Why you -!" Forgetting every last trace of shyness, she lunged at him. Laughing, he dodged out of the way. Quicker than any of them expected, she spun on her heel and almost caught the edge of his robes.

"Whoa! She's fast for an old lady, Harry!"

"I'll show you old lady! Come here, brat!"

"Ha! I think not, hag!"

"Harry, watch where you're -!"

*WHAM!*

"Er- Sorry Ron, sorry 'mione. Yikes!"

"Get back here, Harry!"

"Not the glasses, not the glasses! I said I was sorry!"

"Not good enough!"

"Let go of my hair, Hermi-!"

Suddenly, a pale hand clamped down over his mouth. The three on the ground looked up at Kerri, who was standing stock still, listening intently. "Wha-?" started Hermione, before she too was silenced. And then they all heard it. The crunching of boots on gravel. That in itself was not overly disconcerting, but whoever it was was trying very hard to stay unnoticed. Kerri gritted her teeth, looking like she was trying to decide on something, then hissed, "Move! You've got to get out of here!"

At the sound of her voice the steps quickened, and they could see the gravel on the path a hundred yards away kick up, like someone had started to run. A voice muttered something and the air began to sparkle. Kerri's eye widened. "Bloody hells. Move!"

The curse hit just in front of them, and Hermione, Harry and Ron found themselves propelled backwards into the bushes behind them from the force of it. When they had finally disentangled themselves from the leaves, they looked up just in time to see Kerri get unsteadily to her feet and take off running towards the path, yelling over her shoulder, "Get Dumbledore! Get Dumbledore!!"

They dashed to the front door and yanked it open, hearing it slam against the outside wall as they ran inside.

"It's dinnertime!" gasped Hermione, "They'll all be in the Great Hall!"

Ron skidded to a halt. "We can't go in there, everyone'll panic!"

They stared helplessly at each other for a second, then Hermione had an idea. "The house-elves, of course! They can take a message to Dumbledore without being noticed. Come on!"

The three of them had never been in the kitchen during a meal. The house-elves were bustling about furiously, and it took even Dobby several precious minutes to notice them.

"Harry Potter sir, Dobby is sorry he didn't see you, sir! But isn't Harry Potter and his friends supposed to be eating dinner? Why are they here?" The happy house-elf rambled on and on, with Harry trying desperately to get him to listen, until Hermione lost her temper.

"Oh for pity's sake!" she snapped, and grabbed the next house-elf running by. Its small face wrinkled in annoyance when it saw it was her. "Oh, no time for that! I have a job for you!" At the word "job," the house-elf immediately lit up like a birthday cake, and began to bow. Hermione rolled her eyes. "Listen to me. I need you to take a very important message to Headmaster Dumbledore, understand? Tell him that someone outside just attacked the three of us and Kerri Harper, all right? And be quiet about it, we don't need the whole school panicking."

The house-elf scurried off, and Hermione grabbed Harry's sleeve. "Let's wait outside the Great Hall, Harry. We can meet Dumbledore there."

Harry shook Dobby off of his leg, and the three rushed to the doors of the Great Hall, just as Dumbledore emerged, with Snape, and oddly enough, Neville in tow. He motioned for the three to stay inside as he walked quickly by.

Ron looked curiously at Neville, hissing, "Why're you going?"

"I . . dunno!" gasped Neville, out of breath from trying to keep up with the Headmaster. "Dumbledore . . told me . . to come!"

***

Oh gods . . .

It had been pure luck that there had been enough of a lull in the noise for Kerri to notice the furtive footsteps. At that moment, she knew that the day she had been dreading had finally come. The Death Eaters had arrived to finish the job. Perhaps I shouldn't have mouthed off to Malfoy like I did. She hoped that there was only the one that she had noticed or she was dead. With only one there was a chance.

Praying that she wouldn't get the response from her wand that she had been getting all day, she pulled it out. But it was no use. It only fizzled gently when she tried to cast a spell. "Bugger, bugger, bugger!" she hissed. The hard way then, she thought, fingering her potions knife. I'd better have enough strength for this.

She tried desperately to recall all of the training she had been given by the Aurors as she ran towards the invisible figure. Or at least, where she hoped the figure was. She didn't have to wonder long, though.

A blazing hot curse flew through the air towards her head. She threw herself to the side, feeling the ends of her hair crinkle from the heat. When she hit the ground again, she felt something in her shoulder give way, and she let out a muffled grunt of pain. Looking up, she tried to see where the next curse would come from, but saw nothing. She felt a stab of cold fear in her stomach. I'm going to die, aren't I? As she lay there on her side, her attacker finally threw off the charm that was cloaking him, and revealed himself to the light.

It was a young man, not much older than herself, dressed all in black, holding a wand pointed right at her head. He laughed. It was not a nice laugh.

She laughed too, then. Hysterically. "You think - I really - c-care?" she managed between the shrieks. "Death Eaters - n-never give - you a choice. You'll - just do - what I - haven't - m-managed to - all these - years." She stopped laughing then and shakily held up her left arm, revealing the smooth skin. "You s-see that? T-there used to be a gash almost to the bone there. I did it myself. I thought I could stop it all myself. But I couldn't, they saw to that." The hysterical laughter started again as tears ran down her cheeks. "Oh no, they saw to that. I tried, but my bloodless arm wouldn't let me! Hahahahah! Couldn't keep me and couldn't let me go! Ahahahahah!"

Pale, the young man raised his wand. He hadn't been prepared for this, this maddened girl. He cast about for a solution and saw it in the forms of Dumbledore, Snape, and the very confused Neville, running towards them. "You see those three, girl? I'll kill them instead." His grin returned as she looked over her shoulder and cried out in horror. "I'll bet I get quite a reward for offing Albus Dumbledore!"

Once again, he didn't receive quite the result he expected, as Kerri flung herself at his throat. A thin dagger flashed into her hand before slamming into his shoulder. The girl felt the thud as she connected and continued her rush, bearing him down to the ground. "Not him!" she snarled as she twisted the knife, feeling it scrape against the bone. "I won't let you have him too! Not Neville! Damn you, can't you Death Eaters just leave them alone?!" She stared at him wildly through her hair, tears now flowing freely. "You killed Mommy and Daddy, and they told me you got Mama and Papa too, but I won't let you have their son!"

Painfully, the Death Eater scrabbled for his wand, digging it into Kerri's side. He hissed out a curse that slammed into the girl like a sledgehammer, but she refused to loosen her desperate grip on the knife. The young man growled under his breath and gripped her throat with her free arm until she gasped for breath. She released the knife then, to clutch at her throat. The Death Eater pushed her off of him and pointed his wand right between her eyes. At that moment, Kerri felt a spell tugging at her, and managed to pry away the man's fingers enough so that it yanked her away. The curse still caught her a glancing blow, opening a gash on her forehead.

She landed on something rather bony, and an arm wrapped around her waist to steady her. Mind reeling from the curse and lack of air, unable to do anything but try to breathe, she hung on and stared at the man on the ground.

Clutching his shoulder, the Death Eater stood and prepared to finish them off. Unfortunately for him, he only got as far as raising his wand before two Stupefy Charms hit him right in the chest. His eyes rolled back into his head and he collapsed, twitching a few times before he lay still.

Dumbledore, wand still out, walked over to the crumpled form and nudged it a few times with his toe. When there was no response, he relaxed and turned to a still horribly confused Neville. "Thank you, Mr. Longbottom. You did exactly what I hoped you would do."

Catching her breath then, Kerri moaned and weakly lifted her head. Seeing Snape glaring down at her, she closed her eyes and let her head fall back. "I've died and gone to hell."

"Ha very ha, Miss Harper. You realize, of course, this was entirely your fault. Had you been at dinner like you were supposed to be . . ." He trailed off and eyed her coldly. "I hope you're feeling sufficiently independent. If you weren't bleeding so badly, I'd slap you."

"Well, if you'd stop spinning, I'd do the same to you," she retorted, feeling queasy when she opened her eyes again. She felt something running down her face. Realizing with a sickly start that it was blood, the ground lurched under her feet and she clutched at the arm supporting her. Gods, no . . . "I don't feel so good."

"I'm not surprised." Snape looked at his stained robes in distaste. "I didn't think you had this much blood in you." Looking critically at her skin, which was starting to look bluish, he scooped her up in his arms and pressed his hand against the wound on her side, ignoring her hiss of pain and weak plea that he please stop talking about blood. "I sincerely hope you've learnt your lesson."

Her feeble struggles and insistences that she was to be put down ceased when Dumbledore and Neville came up behind Snape. Brow creased with worry, Dumbledore inspected her. "You'd better take her to the Hospital Wing at once, Severus." He brushed her hair out of her eyes, "You handled yourself very well in protecting Hogwarts, my dear. We three thank you."

The look on Snape's face suggested that he did nothing of the sort as he started off to the Hospital Wing, but Kerri didn't notice. She glanced at the worried-looking boy beside Dumbledore and a slight smile touched her lips. "He didn' get you, Neville . ." she mumbled, slipping into unconsciousness, "At least he didn' get yo- . . ."