A/N:

Hello everyone! As it's New Year's Eve, I want to wish you all a Happy New Year for the hours to come.

Let's hope 2022 is less of a shower than 2021. Fingers crossed, yeah?

Now, on with the story. I hope you enjoy!

It was the morning of the first day of the end of year Hogwarts exams (OWLs and NEWTs too), and Hogwarts Castle woke to a beautiful spring day. Outside, the sun shone down on the castle grounds, glittering off the usually dull surface of the Black Lake, banishing the looking shadows of the Forbidden Forest. The birds called as they soared overhead, merpeople briefly surfaced in the lake, even the unicorns were sighted, frolicking in the sunshine. There wasn't even a cloud in sight. It would have been a perfect day for a quidditch match. Unfortunately, the only people out to enjoy the sunshine were Hagrid and Professor Kettleburn, both busy setting up for the Care of Magical Creatures practical exams that the third and sixth years would be fortunate enough to sit that day. The rest of the castle would be stuck indoors, crammed into boiling rooms (the Divination and Potions exams) or otherwise sitting inside, forced to write exams when they'd love nothing better than to be outside enjoying the rare Scottish sunshine.

High up in the Gryffindor Tower, there were few people who were awake enough to yet give a hoot about the unfairly beautiful day they had been blessed with. In the sixth year boy's dormitory, James Potter was up and singing loudly in the shower, blasting out a medley of Beatles' classics interspersed with the odd shout of 'Puddlemere United!'. Remus Lupin, of course, was already awake, using his few moments of peace (James's singing notwithstanding) to eat some chocolate while scanning his potions notes one last time. Lucky Peter Pettigrew was safely ensconced behind his curtains, sound asleep and oblivious to all around him. Benjy Fenwick and Frank Longbottom were not so fortunate, both newly awake and clutching their pillows over their heads to drown out James's exuberant singing. Sirius Black was also wide awake, laying on his stomach on his bed with an open motorcycle magazine in front of him. A slight smirk loitered about his lips as he glanced at the door adjoining their dormitory.

James, now humming tunelessly, threw open the door, a bucket of bright pink paint tipping over his head.

"Ha bloody ha, Pads" James glowered, vanishing the mess with an irritated wave of his wand.

Sirius just smirked, waving his fingers in sarcastic acknowledgement. "That, Prongs old mate, is what you get when you wake the entire sodding dormitory with your godawful wailing bright and early on a Monday morning."

James, naturally, gave this the consideration it was due. Then, he shrugged, tossed his wand onto his bed, and leapt upon Sirius with a fierce war cry.

Remus laid the lastest sheaf of parchment on his chest, the page fluttering with the force of his sigh. He glanced across to Benjy's bed, green eyes meeting exasperated bright blue. "I bet Rose doesn't have to put up with this today."

Remus was right. Rose didn't have to put up with James and Sirius' familiar, if unavoidably irritating, antics that particular morning. She did, however, have to put up with something far, far worse. She - and the rest of her fellow dormmates - had to endure Lily Evans on the morning of the beginning of their end of year exams. The horror of horrors. The pinnacle of all things terrifying.

While James was just beginning to enjoy his warm shower and belt out the greater portion of the Let It Be album, Rose was still enjoying the final moments of her once-blissful slumber. Marlene McKinnon, Emmeline Vance, Hestia Jones, Dorcas Meadowes, Alice Fortescue, and Mary MacDonald were similarly occupying that mystical, magical land of Nod. Alas, this peace was not to last. Behind scarlet curtains in the middle bed on the far side of the dormitory, an alarm began to ring. It wasn't a quiet alarm with a gentle, almost soothing, buzzing. Oh no. This was a caterwaul alarm, erupting with earbursting shrieks that echoed shrilly around the circular dormitory.

Lily Evans shot bolt upright in her bed, red hair a birds nest from her slumber, cheek still crinkled from the crease of her pillow. There was no one awake yet to see her smile, and she did, glancing at the perfectly organised stacks of notes resting by her bed. She brushed her messy hair out of her face, the alarm still wailing around her.

Dorcas half raised off her bed, pushing the curtains apart enough to glare at the redhead. "I hate you."

"Turn off the bloody alarm!" Marlene shouted, voice muffled from beneath her pillow.

"What she said!" Alice agreed, head sticking out from the gap in her curtains.

Emmeline toppled out of her bed, pillow clutched protectively to her head. "Shut it up, shut it up, shut it up!"

A normal person, when faced with the fury of their friends, might act a little sheepish or apologetic. But Lily was made from different stock. Her sister was a Marauder, after all. She just wiggled her shoulders a little and finally stopped the infernal wailing. "Oh good" Lily smiled brightly. "You're up!"

"We're up?" Dorcas questioned, a slightly hysterical note in her voice. "The entire bloody Western world is up, Lily!"

Mary held up a finger, almost afraid to interrupt the argument. "Um" she said timidly. "Rose isn't."

As a matter of fact, Rose was.

Rose was just trying vainly to ignore this salient fact and do the sane thing - go back to sleep. She laid perfectly still in bed, eyes closed, breathing soft and steady; no sign at all that her apparently now insant sister had woken her with her possessed alarm. Even with her eyes shut (and the covers pulled over her head - she wasn't stupid), she could tell the exact moment when her dormmates (no longer deserving the title of friends) decided to share the misery. Her curtains were fairly ripped open, and Rose could feel the stares of the others burning into her.

A finger gently prodded the spot on the duvet over her shoulder. "Wakey wakey" Alice called tentatively.

Seriously? Rose internally raised an eyebrow. They would really have to do better than that to wake this particular pretending-to-be-sleeping Marauder.

Apparently Marlene thought so too, judging by the scoff she let out. "For Merlin's sake, Alice" the blonde sighed. "Move over." The covers were whipped off her head, Marlene's gaze boring into her. "Rose!"

Lily audibly rolled her eyes, leaping upon Rose's bed. The mattress rolled like a ship caught in a storm, Lily not giving Rose a moment's peace.

Rose gave up, sprang upright and shoved her sister onto the floor. The act was met with cheers from her friends, except Mary who offered Lily a hand up off the floor.

"Morning Rosie" Lily chirped, apparently oblivious to the death stare she was now receiving.

Rose hated being woken up this early. She really, really did. The only things she hated more were Slytherins and morning people. They were the worst.

"Lily, I love you" Rose informed her sister gravely. "This is why you have to know that it will pain me deeply, but ultimately not stop me, from doing this." She paused, staring expressionlessly at her twin. "I have to now kill you."

"What?" Lily gasped, blinking innocently. "Did you want to sleep in on the morning of your first exams?"

Rose shared a look with her fellow roommates. They all stared at Lily like she'd grown another head. "Yes!"

Lily shrugged. "Oops?"

Rose raised an eyebrow, hand inching back towards her bed. "This calls for retribution" she announced, smirking at Marlene's subtle nod. Rose snatched her pillow from her bed, raising it high above her head. "For Gryffindor!"

Thwunk went the pillow against Lily's head.

"For Gryffindor!" the others cried, pillows flying.

Eventually, Lily managed to evade them all long enough that the pillow war was called off. And then it was time to begin readying for the day. A truly solemn moment that they all treated with the gravity it deserved. Marlene put her favourite station on the wireless, turning it up just as loud as Lily's detestable alarm. They sang along to the songs they knew and critiqued the ones they didn't, slowly getting dressed and ready to face the day. Alice put on her lucky socks, bubblegum pink and patterned with bubbles. Mary spot ironed (using a very clever little charm) everything she was going to wear for the day. Marlene pretended such traditions were above her, yet she rubbed the lion's head engraved on to her locket for luck, just as she always did. Emmeline got dressed on the other side of her bed from usual (her strange pre-exam tradition) while Hestia dug around in her trunk for her lucky clover earrings. Dorcas sat in front of her mirror, methodically pulling her hair back into the ponytail she favoured, securing it with a vibrant blue band. Lily sat on her bed, already dressed immaculately in her robes, surrounded by a flower of notes, nodding as she scanned the cramped writing. And Rose herself sat on the end of her bed, pulling on her platform boots (nobody told a Marauder what they could and couldn't wear with their robes - at least not if they expected to be listened to), thumb brushing against the star pendant Remus had given her for her birthday. She had no real pre-exam dressing tradition - hers lay instead in the reassuring nods she shared with James and Sirius, Remus and Peter (or whichever combination of her friends she had the exams with) before they walked into the room to sit their exams. Nevertheless, this time spent with the Girls was a tradition in and of itself, an auspicious start to a week that - as Remus often said - would determine their future at Hogwarts. Succeed and they return in September as final year, NEWT-level students, fail and they re-do an entire year. A year that had already been unkind to them. But Rose refused to even think that. This year owed them some good (even considering that yes they had passed their apparition tests), their exams would go fine. Come September, they'd be NEWT students. Merlin help them.

Outside, it was another golden day, somewhere nearby Frank was waiting for Alice - ready to greet his girlfriend and wish her all the best for her exams. Benjy was wandering through the corridors towards the Great Hall, probably fortuitously bumping into a very stressed Caradoc and walking with his best friend to breakfast. And, sprawled on their usual chairs and couches in the common room (glaring away any firstie or second year that dared try and claim them before them), James and Sirius and Remus and Peter would be waiting for her. Some mornings, they would already be down in the Great Hall or the kitchens, enjoying their breakfast, but not today. Big mornings always saw the Marauders leave the Gryffindor Tower as a unit - a symbol of the support and friendship they would carry, even should the day see them separated. It was the little things that made all the difference in the world, little traditions that - however superstitious or meaningless to the rest - just let them all face the beginning of their exams with a little more confidence and comfort.

The Great Hall was buzzing with conversation when James led the Marauders inside. Most were hushed murmurs, reviewing notes and spells for whatever exam they had up first. Others, though, were still discussing the prank from the previous night, spirits buoyed just as they had intended. Rose took her usual seat, scanning the available options for breakfast. Her stomach churned sympathetically, Lily looking slightly queasy a ways down the table. Opposite her, James and Sirius were already tucking into Full English breakfasts, while Peter opted for porridge and scrambled eggs. Remus laughed at them with his eyes, a bowl of coco quaffels drowning in milk before him. Rose grabbed the first bowl before her, happy enough with good old-fashioned cornflakes. There was a brief silence before Remus frowned thoughtfully, raising his spoon halfway into the air.

"Oh no, no, no" James immediately cried, shaking his head frantically. "We're not doing this, this year."

Remus glanced down sadly. "But-"

"Nope" James reiterated, popping the p like it was Droobles Best Blowing Gum.

Rose patted Remus' arm in a conciliatory fashion. "Every year, Remmy" she said "you want us to talk about the exams before and then after we sit them. Remember the last time we did that?"

Remus sighed, grumbling something under his breath.

Sirius smirked pointily. "What was that, mate?"

Remus glowered, narrowing his eyes at a far too amused Sirius. "Padfoot and Prongs were bored so they hung Snivellus up by his ankle. Then Snivelly called Lily a you-know-what, Lily got irritated at him, didn't speak to any of us for ages." Remus paused, inclining his head in sarcastic musing. "Oh and you lot pantsed Snivellus anyway."

James looked wistfully into the distance. "Good times. Good times."

Up until then, it was a fairly ordinary morning for the Marauders - well, within the context of their exam weeks. Rose would have been ecstatic if it had continued in the same way. Unfortunately, this was the school year of 1976/77 and it hated them. Rose had already had all the proof of this she needed: Sirius' disownment, then the Death Eaters attacking Hogsmeade on his birthday, then Bellatrix, Rose's grandfather dying, the involvement of the Slytherins in the war (although they would all have had to have been truly idiotic not to see that coming), the news about her father (hopefully still looking hopeful, but she hadn't heard from her Dad in a while), and finally the upsurge in the reports of death, destruction and general bad things happening around wizarding Britain and Europe. All in all, Rose wasn't surprised when the morning took a turn more in keeping with the theme of the school year.

The cacophonous sound of flapping wings filled the air, all eyes raising to the ceiling. Owl post. Rose scanned the incoming owls for any sign of Hermes, but came up short. Glimfeather carried a parcel for Remus (undoubtedly one of the many books he had ordered a few weeks back), while a few solemn looking owls were heading in towards Rose and her friends. Familiar tubes were clutched in their talons, writing undecipherable on their sides. "Time for the Prophet" Sirius commented, wiping his hands off on a napkin. "What fresh horrors are they reporting today?"

James smirked, the expression far from reaching his eyes. "You never know, Pads" he quipped. "Maybe it'll be good news. Maybe the Minister's finally done the decent thing and resigned."

"Ha" Remus laughed mirthlessly. "That'll be the day. He loves his power too much to do that. Even if he is bungling this whole situation."

Peter muttered something about cheese, relieving his mother's owl of his letter.

Rose shared a look with her friends, taking a breath before she shook open her copy of the Daily Prophet.

A black and white wizarding photo showed the Dark Mark floating over a fairly ordinary field, scorch marks burned into the ground. There was no body to be found within the simple photograph, but Rose didn't need one to know what had happened. Remus cast his gaze down at the table, eyes shadowed. Sirius' jaw tightened, knuckles white as they gripped his goblet. James cursed under his breath, folding the paper over so he didn't have to look at the familiar image. Rose scanned the article (as poorly written as ever - the Prophet journalists did a horrible job of keeping their spirits up), heart growing heavy in her chest. A half blood wizard (as yet unnamed, but Rose was under no illusions that the gutter-scraping Prophet journalists would hold off long) had been found dead that previous night by a muggle farmer. Unspeakables had been called to the scene, wiping the minds of the also unnamed muggle and the first responders. The article did say that the wizard had been reported missing over a month before, and that he had been subjected to torture before he died.

Sirius calmly, far too calmly, set his goblet down and took a deep breath. James darted a look to him out of the corner of his eye, reading the danger signs just as clearly as Rose, Remus and Peter were. Sieius being this calm meant absolutely nothing good. "Every week" he sneered, balling up the paper in front of him. "Every sodding week we see these bloody headlines. Disappearances, deaths, Merlin only knows what else." Grey eyes snapped up towards the high table and Dumbledore's empty chair. "They're supposed to be out there, stopping this from bloody well happening. And yet, once again they've failed. And we're stuck in here, worrying about shifty Slytherins and exams as if the whole world isn't falling apart." Sirius laughed bitterly, anger burning in his face. "We might as well let Reggie and Mulciber and their cronies have free run in here. Godric knows it'll be that way when they get out there."

"Siri" Rose breathed, wishing she could reach out across the table to him. The fact that she was so far away from him was a habit as old as their united friendship, but there were times when his sitting next to James and opposite her at most every meal was less than helpful.

Sirius tore his eyes away from the Slytherin table - where he had been death glaring at Snape, Regulus and Mulciber to name a few. "I'm just angry" he sighed, defeat weighing heavier than anger in his smooth accent. "It'll pass, I'm sure, in time."

The corner of James's mouth turned down, the stag animagus clenching his jaw in frustration. "There's only one way to beat these bastards" he said, voice strong enough for them to head yet soft enough that it wouldn't carry. To the rest of the castle, it looked as if they were having another of their infamous debates. "We live."

Sirius laughed harshly, sweeping a hand across the hall. "You call this living, Prongs?"

"You're darn tooting, I do" James grinned, his natural humour shining through. "It sucks, Sirius. But we all knew that it was always going to. This, what we've got here, is a life. It might not be everybody's cup of tea, but it's ours. And letting those murdering scumbags get one over on us is simply unacceptable, my friend."

Sirius stared blankly at him, apparently determined to stay attached to his misery. "And how, pray tell, do we stop that, oh genius?"

James sighed, shaking his head at Sirius' obstinance. "Well, not to sound like Moony, but first we pass these exams. Then, we have a fun summer holiday, probably see a few quidditch matches, spy on a few former and current snakes. Then, once we've done that, we come back here, kick some NEWT year arse, graduate with flying colours, get accepted into the Auror training program. Bob's your uncle."

"You're bonkers, mate" Sirius informed him, a tantalising hint of a smirk flitting about his face. "But that's mad enough I think we can pull it off."

"Of course we can" Remus agreed, smiling with the bite of sass he had long perfected. "We're the bloody Marauders."

If Sirius trip jinxed and toenail hexed a few Slytherin students as they walked out of the Great Hall after breakfast, nobody so much as batted an eyelid. Well, the Slytherin students certainly did, but not any of the Marauders. It was pretty much taken as a given that to get back to his normal self, Sirius would have to blow off a little steam. Rose was just glad that this time it didn't involve hunting down Regulus, punching him in the smug face and then getting drunk at the Hogs Head. Small mercies, as her father would say.

As they all began strolling down the corridor, Sirisu turned to Remus with a smirk.

"So, oh keeper of the exam schedule, what tedious regurgitation of everything we've learned this year do we have first?"

Remus pulled out a piece of parchment from his pocket, as if he didn't have the entire thing memorised. His shoulders slumped just a little. "Potions" he sighed, already dreading the exam for his work subject. Rose didn't mean to make that sound dramatic, Remus usually scraped at least an A in the subject, but he never the less did not look forward to sitting the exams.

Rose hooked her arm around his, grinning. "Look on the bright side, Remmy" she suggested, her smile in her voice. "Once you've done it, you can move onto the exams you actually want to sit. Ancient Runes, Arithmancy, Transfiguration, Defense Against the Dark Arts."

Remus glared balefully at her. "And spend the entire time worrying that I've failed the potions practical."

"You, Remus Lupin, are a worrywart" James announced, hexing a Slytherin third year as they passed on the stairs.

Remus shook his head. "And you, James Potter, are an immature egotist."

James beamed "Thank you!"

Sirius held up his hand, forestalling Remus' snarky response. "He really didn't mean that as a compliment, Prongs" he smirked, pausing just long enough before adding "and neither does Evans."

"I" James cried dramatically "am misunderstood."

Sirius clipped him around the head. "You are a plonker."

"Come on, you lot" Remus heaved a sigh gustier than most hurricanes. "Time for our potions exams."

James rubbed the back of his head, muttering mutinously "He's the plonker."

As the Great Hall would be occupied this week for the OWL and NEWT written and practical exams, the sixth year Potions exams took place in the dungeons. Surprising absolutely nobody. This led James and Sirius to hexing and/or jinxing quite a few snakes as they wound their way down to the dungeons for the last official time that school year. The rest of their class was already lined up outside the classroom, nervously shifting from foot to foot, or frantically scanning notes and the potions textbook.

Sirius leaned casually against the wall, arms and ankles crossed, a confident smirk adorning his lips. He had a right to be confident - he was, after all the best of them at potion making, despite the fact he found it a waste of his time. James mirrored Sirius' pose, humming under his breath. Rose knew he was doing it to irritate the others, but she had never let it get to her. Yes, they did need to get good grades to progress to the NEWT level class, but Sluggy was desperate by now to collect them into his little Club, so there was no way in hell that he would miss letting them continue with him for another year. Remus closed his eyes, focusing on deep, even breaths as a way to control his nerves before the exam. Peter was one of the students who was frantically glancing over their notes - more for show than anything else, Peter had to keep up his image of the bumbling Marauder, but partly because potions flustered him and he liked to have everything straight in his head before he started his exams. Rose herself forced down the butterflies in her stomach, reminding herself that the professors liked to make them wait awhile. Wishing it sooner would do no good and only make her all the more apprehensive about the actual content. She was a Marauder. They would ace this exam. That was that. A few people down from the Marauders, Lily was having a last look into her books, an action to settle her nerves more than anything else, as everyone knew that Lily was Slughorn's star student, his pride and joy. Old Sluggy never missed an opportunity to bemoan the fact that Lily had been sorted into Gryffindor instead of his own house - much like he often did with Sirius. Frankly, Rose was glad that they both were Gryffindors. She couldn't imagine her life at Hogwarts without Lily in her dormitory and Sirius everywhere else. Anything other than that seemed wrong on every conceivable level.

In the hour that followed, Rose wrote what she felt was a good ten feet on the draught of living death, amortentia, Felix Felicis, and the potion to cure coughs. Plus another good half dozen feet on the Essence of Insanity, veritaserum; everything they had covered that entire school year. Then, once her hand was good and cramping from the strain of getting all the pertinent (and some of the not quite so pertinent, just for good measure) information down on the parchment, it was time for their practical exam. Well, technically they had an hour's worth of a break, so the firsties could come down and Slughorn could oversee their exam, but it was close enough Rose didn't want to quibble. They spent their free hour in a chamber down in the dungeons, ostensibly so they didn't 'cause any trouble'. Rose felt personally slighted by such an accusation - it wasn't as if they always spent their free time chucking dung bombs into the occupied classrooms. Regardless, after an hour - which Remus insisted they spend reviewing their potions textbook so they wouldn't 'completely cock up, Padfoot' their practical exam - they were ushered back into their usual potions dungeon. Their cauldrons were already set up, ingredients resting in their usual places to the right of their cauldrons. In short, everything was now ready for them to brew their last potions of the 1976/77 Hogwarts school year.

Remus had his head in his hands next to Rose, muttering incomprehensibly and seeming to sink further into his seat with every passing second. James and Sirius were on Rose's other side, with Peter sharing a table with Frank, Benjy and Caradoc just on the other side of theirs. Slughorn stood at the front of the room, prattling on about something the Marauders had apparently unanimously agreed to ignore on principle - Slugbrain was the head of the Slytherin house, after all. "It's going to be Veritaserum or Felicus" Remus mumbled, a sharp edge of hysteria to his words. "Merlin's Underpants."

"Would someone hit him with a cheering charm, for Godric's sake" Sirius drawled, flicking a smirk over at the worrying Marauder. "He's starting to get on my nerves."

"Relax, Siri" Rose teased, checking over her potions supplies. "We'll be told what we're supposed to be brewing soon, then Remus will be too busy to get on your nerves with his worrying."

Sirius cut her an amused look. "It's dealing with him between then and now that's bothering me, sweetheart" he replied, but stopped fingering his potions knife significantly. James sighed and followed suit, muttering something about how much more relaxed they all would have been if Moony would just cheer up for Merlin's sake.

Slughorn finally stopped ruffling his moustache with useless information and turned to the class with a smile on his face. "Today you will brew your final potions of sixth year. For your practical exam, I want to see delicacy, attention to detail, the perfect balance of ingredients. It is for that reason, that you will all be brewing the Sleeping Draught, also known as the Potion of Dreamless Sleep." Slughorns gaze fell on Lily, Snape, Sirius, and a few others in turn. "Madame Pomfrey is always looking for fresh supplies of this popular medicinal potion. Brew it well, you all should pass. Brew it excellently, as I know a few of you are capable, and you shall pass with flying colours. You have three hours. Good luck, your time starts now."

"Three hours" Remus groaned, thumping his head onto the table. "This is going to be a nightmare."

James reached across Rose to pat him on the back. "That's the spirit, Moony."

Thank you for reading!

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