*Six days left*
"Maybe this shouldn't be our first task" Severus mumbled as he and the rest of the recruits gathered around a rickety table.
"Shut it weasel, if you're getting second thoughts I can kill you now" Regulus glared at him, unrolling the map to show the pin points they'd placed on it "We've barely got any time left to plan so get your act together or get out"
"I'm not here to moan, this is just pointless" Severus argued, but refused to look weak to the rest of them "Plus your plan's flawed, you can't only attack from one side, you're leaving room for anyone to sneak in and attack you back. And doing it here makes no sense, they'll meet here so why bother forcing them to the gate first?"
Regulus looked like he wanted to use the Cruciatus curse on him there and then, but instead punched the table and picked out all of the pins, arranging them in a circle around a group of stickers.
"And we can't kill anyone in the area" Severus managed to add, thinking it didn't sound too suspicious. He couldn't risk Lily getting killed.
And why's that?" Bellatrix looked too disappointed.
"Because… If we kill bystanders we'll have less Hogwarts students to take captive and convert later on, these are the people who we need to fight for us further on in the war" They all glared at him for a bit, squinting at his eyes looking for any hint of betrayal.
"If any of them get in my way, they're not leaving unless it's on a stretcher" Regulus warned, not believing Severus' reasoning was the real reason he didn't want to kill anyone.
"If any of them are stupid enough to get in our way we don't need them anyway" Bellatrix butted in, twirling one of the pins around as she sat lazily back on a chair "Besides, we've got other people to concentrate on, who gives a damn about measly students?"
"You underestimate Lily Evans" Severus thought to himself before they shoved the table back to the side of the room and stomped up the stairs to the practice room.
The room was like the Hogwarts practice rooms only in that there were dummies lining the walls, however these dummies shot out actual curses when activated. Barbed wire and flames were spread messily around the rubble filled floor.
"I can't believe this practice room is so over the top" Severus muttered angrily to himself as he threw the killing curse at a dummy who almost shot his ear off.
"If you want to be as unprepared as those hoity toity goody two shoes, only ready for a little expelliarmus duel, you'll be killed within three days" Bellatrix snarled, marching through the rubble, blowing it apart and kicking the feet of a dummy out from under it before pinning it and killing it.
"No-one said I wasn't ready" Severus clenched his fists and ran through, every curse flung from his wand made him more and more angry at how naive Hogwarts was making everyone. "This isn't what the world should be" He thought to himself "We can't be mollycoddled like this anymore"
Regulus was close to blowing the head off the largest dummy after he'd been thrown to the floor when the door slammed open and Orion and Walburga Black came striding in, forcing all of the dummies to a hault.
"Just checking how training's going for the Dark Lord" Mr Black announced, scouring the room looking for Regulus and dragging him to his feet once he'd seen him lying on the floor "Not falling behind are we?" He glared down at him, patting him on the back and smiling when Regulus shaked his head uncertainly.
"I see Sirius never made it" Walburga scowled at Regulus, annoyed he hadn't made him come.
"How could I make that brainless douche do anything?" He moaned, brushing off brick dust and sliding his wand back into his back pocket.
"Such a disappointment" She pursed her lips and frowned at Regulus who was unsure which son she was disappointed in.
"We need an update on your plans, can't have amateurs taking on my enemies without checking they have a clue what they're doing, can I" Severus slowly stood back as she spoke, her voice like nails on a chalkboard to him as she sounded disgusted by every word she had to say to them.
After Regulus had shakily talked through the plan they nodded and left the house, seemingly thrilled to get away.
"I thought you'd be proud" Regulus thought, wringing his hands as they left him alone again.
"I don't know if this is possible, but I think there's sponge in my ear" Sirius tried to get everyone's attention at the evening meal as he slapped his right ear "I noticed it in Potions and I don't mean to overreact, but I think it might be fatal"
"Pads" James sighed, slapping Sirius' hand away from the side of his face "That thing you're feeling? That's your brain, be forgiven for thinking it's a small bit of sponge"
"You've really hurt me Prongs" Sirius tried to fake cry but James had thrown a chicken wing at him which shut him up pretty quickly.
"I was talking to Dumbledore the other day" James started, worried about changing the mood.
"As you do" Remus remarked,
"Ok then, I purposely went up to Dumbledore's office to talk to Dumbledore the other day" James raised his eyebrows at Remus to get his approval "There's a meeting about the Order of the Phoenix on Saturday in the Three Broomsticks, the final sign up I suppose, he gave me a code word for Rosmerta"
"I can't believe this is actually happening!" Lily smiled "Finally a chance to fight for real, to give our today for everyone else to live in peace tomorrow"
"And kill some evil bastards" Sirius added, getting a glare off Lily for ruining her profound moment.
"Are we all in then?" James asked keenly, everyone said yes apart from Sasha.
"Umm" She began, twirling her spaghetti around on her fork looking for the words to explain her thoughts "I can't"
"Why Sash?" Kara sounded genuinely hurt because Sasha was turning down the opportunity to do something she had no choice but to refuse.
"I never wanted this war to happen, this has nothing to do with me, my family would never want me fighting for this"
"What do you mean you family wouldn't want you fighting for this?" Sirius looked offended.
"They don't believe that there's any real threat in any of this, that the ministry's too strong to be overthrown by some rebels"
"Some REBELS?" James was as annoyed as Sirius now "Are your family stupid?"
"Don't talk like that about my family" Sasha slammed her fork down on her plate "What makes their opinion any less valid then yours?"
"This" James slapped the morning paper down in front of her, the front page covered by the headline
Twenty dead as Death Eaters attack Birmingham town center
"Don't remind me of that" Sasha flinched back as if the paper was physically hurting her. Her aunt had been killed in the attack.
"You of all people should know there's something worth fighting for" James' expression softened, he knew all too well what it was like to lose a loved one, even more so now.
"No. It showed me that putting yourself in the middle of it's only going to get you hurt" Sasha argued, shoving the paper away and thinking about the letter she'd got from her mom that morning telling her they were one disaster away from pulling her out of school.
"Who cares if WE get hurt?" James persisted "It's just us and God knows how many more thousands of people"
"I don't want to talk about this anymore" Sasha concluded, downing the rest of her drink and storming out of the Great Hall. Kara looked at everyone and after realizing they weren't going to do anything she ran after her.
"You can't force people to fight for your belief James" Lily tried explaining to him as he glared at the spot where Sasha had just left "You'll become as bad as him"
"We just need everyone to help... I need people to help" James suddenly looked devastated before also running out of the Great Hall, Lily close behind him.
"James! JAMES!" Lily shouted as he charged out of the main doors into the pitch black of the grounds.
The ground was saturated with the earlier rain and mud splattered up Lily's legs as she ran after him, slipping over twice and having to force her way through a thorn bush for a shortcut, she knew where he was going.
After what seemed like forever running Lily came to the Quidditch pitch, James was curled up in a ball in the center, one arm free pounding the ground and he was screaming.
"James!" Lily shouted again, running over to him and collapsing next to him, shocked at how he'd cracked so suddenly.
"HE'S GONE" James looked up, his face smeared with mud.
"Who's gone?" Lily pulled James towards her so they were sat in the mud hugging, his head buried in her shoulder and his screams were replaced by loud croaky sobs. He pulled out a damp, crumpled piece of parchment from his pocket and passed it to Lily.
Mr James Potter,
It is with my greatest regret to inform you that in the most recent attacks to our community your father was kidnapped by Death Eaters while coming in to advise plans of action. We do not currently know the reason why he was targeted but will keep you as well informed as possible
Yours sincerely
Aducium Malnuntis
Speechless, Lily just held onto James tighter as the rain started to beat down on them.
"We'll get him" She whispered furiously into his ear "We don't lose another"
*Five days left*
"GET UP" Lily shouted at Sirius, Remus and Peter the next morning as she threw open their dormitory curtains, the harsh light beaming down on them and almost blinding them.
"God's sake Evans, let me sleep" Sirius groaned, rolling onto his side and pulling his duvet over himself.
"No you lazy dipshit, we're skipping school" Lily was trying her best to hold in her anger until James explained what was going on, but she couldn't help rolling Sirius onto the floor and whacking Peter in the head with a pillow.
"YOU want US to skip school?" Remus stared in disbelief at Lily as she rushed Sirius into the bathroom to get ready.
"We'll explain later, just meet us by the fourth floor passage in fifteen minutes" Lily glanced at her watch, it was quarter to five and they were running out of time to get away.
Fifteen minutes later she couldn't believe how many people had showed up to help. Before her stood Remus, Sirius, Peter, Kara, Marlene, Emmeline, Dorcas, Benjy, Caradoc, and Dedalus, all looking terrified.
James walked up to the group looking totally shocked at what Lily had done for him "Guys I can't ask any of you to do this for me" He admitted, shaking his head.
"And yet here we are" Benjy pointed out "We can't call ourselves fighters if we can't help you"
"Yeah, stop trying to stop this from happening James or else we'll get caught sneaking out" Marlene glanced around worriedly "They'll see us leaving the gates"
"That's the thing…" Lily didn't want to reveal one of the Marauder's secrets but it was essential "There's another way" With no other explanation Lily swung open the mirror and gestured for the wide eyed students to go through.
Once they were all inside they silently started the decent down the endless stairs. Long burnt out torches were no help to them as they felt their way down.
"Not my most favourite of passages" Sirius muttered to Lily as he tripped for the tenth time.
"I couldn't exactly send them to the shrieking shack could I?" She argued, hoping he could sense that she'd raised her eyebrows.
When they'd reached the bottom the passage opened into a small room before going back to a corridor.
"We'll stay here so we can go over the plan" Lily waved for everyone to stand around.
"Ok" James clenched his fists and breathed in "They took my dad, and we have a place where he might be from what I've heard from him in the past"
"What are we doing when we get there?" Dedalus asked.
"Because we don't even know if he'll be there the only plan we have is to split up into two, use the mirror to communicate, and find him" Lily explained, realising how little of a plan it was.
"We stopped. And gathered around. For that." Sirius summed up, laughing at their plan "Come on let's just go save his dad, what's the worst that could happen?"
So with that everyone carried on down the corridor until they arrived in the Three Broomsticks through a trapdoor under a table in the far corner of the room.
"I'm totally using this to get out of Arithmancy" Dorcas chuckled to herself as she climbed out.
"Ok, I've hidden broomsticks under bushes outside" Lily explained as they slipped out of the unlocked door around the back. After pairing up and getting onto the brooms they flew to Malfoy Manor.
"I think we just found out the worst that could happen" Sirius whispered to James as he and the first group (Sirius, James, Remus, Dorcas, Emmeline, and Benjy) crouched outside the window of Malfoy manor. A long table was in the centre of the room and around it were a group of Death Eaters including Abraxas Malfoy, Lucius Malfoy, and Voldemort himself.
"Well he's clearly here isn't he" James knew Voldemort's inner circle wouldn't have gathered for no reason "We're just stuck on the roof"
"This is stupid, we need to get into that corridor" Remus pointed to the far end of the room where an open door led into a large corridor with rooms on either side of it "He's going to be kept near to them and also we can listen in on them and hide if necessary"
"Sorted" James agreed and gestured for everyone to climb back down the drainpipe to the back of the building. After climbing through an open window they found themselves in a dimly lit room which was totally empty apart from a battered wardrobe in the corner.
James slowly eased open the door and peered out into the corridor. The door was ajar so it blocked out the right hand side of the corridor from the people at the table.
"I can't believe we've left amateurs to… a disgrace and it will fail…Shaws" James could faintly hear the conversation and turned when he thought heard Kara' s name, but shook it off as a mistake.
He pointed individually to his group, then pointed at different doors to show which one to take and they started to search, wand kept out in front of them at all times. The first room James looked it had a huge board at one end covered in notes and diagrams. In the centre was a map of the Ministry and just as James tried to pull off a sheet ominously labelled 'Next' from the top because he couldn't read it, the board swung around and revealed the opposite side which showed a normal painting. Realising they didn't have time for this he moved on, not noticing he was being followed.
Sirius fell down a flight of stairs after he stepped through his door, his wand falling out of his hand and rolling into the darkness.
"Crap" He muttered to himself pulling himself up and feeling around for his wand.
"Sirius?" A faint voice called from the other side of the room.
"Mr Potter!" Sirius leapt up and whacked his head on the low lying ceiling.
"What the hell are you doing here?" James' dad sounded more angry now.
"I could say the same for you" Sirius felt around he found James' dad lying on the floor chained to the wall holding Sirius' wand.
"They wanted the Auror's plans of attack for their base in Scotland" He admitted, passing over the wand "Now please tell me why you've put yourself in one of the most dangerous houses in the country just for me?"
"What do you mean just for you? This is a badass breakout, now come one we need to grab the others" Sirius blew the chains off the wall and fished out the mirror from his pocket, but it was totally black. "Lily?" Sirius whispered worriedly, waiting for a response. Nothing. "Probably busy" He reassured himself.
"Lily's here! How many of you are there?" James' dad grabbed the mirror from Sirius and stared into it desperately.
"Twelve" Sirius admitted, tugging him towards the exit "And we need to find them"
Just as he peered around the door into the corridor Karkaroff came storming towards him and flung open the door.
"What a lovely coincidence" His grin of rotten teeth made Sirius squirm "I've completed my collection" His iron grip got Sirius and Mr Potter, and they were thrown into the hall along with Remus, James, Dorcas, Emmeline and Benjy, all surrounded with a Death Eater with their wands pressed up against their necks. Sirius was thrown next to them and a Death Eater ran over, grabbed his wand, and held him in a death grip.
"Did you really think you could defy me?" Voldemort slowly stood up from his chair and walked over to them, wand raised "Pathetic school children?"
Sirius bit his lips together to stop himself screaming abuse at him which would probably get him killed. He was probably going to be killed anyway.
Author's note:
I'm sorry it's been two weeks but it took two weeks to write and plan, and didn't just forget. I'm enjoying writing more out of the school setting and more with them fighting the war, what do you think?
Mischief Managed