Thanks for the feedback! I always found Snape a complex and torn character. Tough to flesh out. In the last chapter, he is supposed to lead the school for Voldemort and protect the students for Dumbledore. At the same time, his antagonist in the fight has to remind him of his lost love, Lilly.

This is the second of six chapters I have planned for this prologue and it takes place right after the first. The focus is on a new character of my own creation who has a significant impact on the full story I have in my head.

Hope you enjoy and thanks to JKR for letting me share her toys.

Taking a sudden, gasping breath, Neville gingerly raises himself up on his elbows and peers wearingly into the darkness as he regains consciousness. Slowly, his eyes adjust and he can see shadows moving around in the darkness. Without warning, one shadow lights his wand, basking three boys in an eerie blue light. Before he can even react, the second boy, dark skinned with a contempt sneer fixed on his face, jams his wand right into Neville's face. "Time to pay, Longbottom." He spits out.

Neville closes his eyes and waits for death. His prayer though is answered by a new, older voice tinged with an edge that sends a shock of fear up each boy's spine. "I don't think so, Mr. Zabini."

Blaise spins around and blindly fires off a stunner into the cave as Zacharias' wand goes spinning out of his hand and plunges into darkness. As Blaise charges off after the threat, the other boy, now wandless, slides behind the Gryffindor and pulls out a menacing blade from his robes.

Before he can even take a breath at the rapid turn of events, a black boot snaps out of the void missing Neville by centimeters; but not Zacharias. Stunned, Neville watches in abstract horror as the taller boys drops his knife, sways for a moment as he spits out a significant amount of blood and a large number of teeth before falling over limply with a quiet moan.

The silence is broken anew as the other boy's wand can be heard bouncing along the ground several meters away. The arrogant young man's façade is broken as his voice, spiked with fear and confusion, cries out. "Sir?"

"Helada!" The older man mercilessly replies as an electric white light frames Blaise's body for a moment before he crumples to the ground. A short time later, another flash and another word slither through the dark. "Obliviate."

Neville chooses not to wait fight's outcome and as quietly as he can, crawls, pulls, and pushes himself across the uneven ground shutting out in his mind the additional damage this blind escape causes his worn body. Eventually, he hears someone cough nearby and cautiously whispers, "Susan?" In response, he hears someone rummaging around in the darkness nearby before he is partially blinded as a deep, grunted "lumos" brings light to the darkness.

Face torn and bloodied, a bone sticking out of his useless right arm, and his friend's West Ham sweater ruined beyond repair, Seamus looks up at Neville, holding his lit wand limply. "You OK, Nev?"

Appalled by his friend's condition, it takes a moment for him to answer. "Yes," he whispers before looking around and spotting the bound form of a girl a few meters away. He shuffles over to her and luckily finds her wand lying nearby. Carefully, frees her with a slash. "Diffindo."

"Thanks, Nev." The girl smiles before pulling off her muddy ski mast and rubs her back and stretches out her legs. "Nothing is broken, how's Seamus?"

Neville nods in the opposite direction and then they carefully walk over to where the boy, barely conscious, is holding his lit wand. The girl gasps before recovering and takes her wand back from Neville. "Oh, Seamus," she whimpers while mumbling out a handful of spells she hopes will help her friend. "Just stay still."

While watching Susan do her best to put Seamus back together, Neville suddenly remembers what happened only a few moment ago. "Put out the light! Somebody else is down here and just took out Blaise."

"Shit!" Seamus croaks out extinguishing his wand. "How are we going to get Ginny out?"

At a loss for what else to do with her friend, Susan cries. "The way up is blocked and even if we could get through, we wouldn't last a second against Snape and the Death Eaters in the shape we are in."

"No!" Neville bites back in the dark. "We have to do something."

Susan touches the tall boy's shoulder. "We can't Neville. Ginny sacrificed herself for us and the only thing we would accomplish would be to get captured or killed."

Delirious from his injuries; but still filled with range, Seamus can only add, "fuck…"

Neville kneels down and punches the ground is frustration. "This is all my fault!"

They sit in silence lost in their own thoughts for a few moments before a deep, commanding voice cuts through the darkness. "Accio wands!" Two wands fly out of surprised hands and disappear into the darkness.

"Quick!" The girl whispers. "This way," she commands as the three do their best to crawl in the opposite direction of the voice.

Before the trio can move more than a few meters, the same voice grunts out in front of them, "lumos."

The three look up to see one of their wands lit and resting on a small outcropping above their heads. Eventually, they focus on the tall, shadowed figure standing in the middle of the light holding a second wand right at them.

Without warning or hesitation, Seamus hurls a rock at their presumed attacker. With an impatient flick of his black wand, the rock disintegrates into a cloud of dust. Another flick followed by the incantation, "compello dormino," sends the boy down to the ground, unmoving.

From the opposite direction, Neville jumps up to punch the cloaked figure in the face only for the man to step out of the way and grab his exposed arm into a painful elbow lock. "Ow!" Neville screams as his brutalized body protests the harsh treatment.

From behind, Susan lunges at the man screaming with a rock locked in her hand. But, before she can close the distance, Neville is thrown in into her sending them both crashing to the ground. She opens her mouth to scream again; but is cut off with an annoyed, "silencio."

Before the pair can make another attempt, the wand that was lighting their corner of the mammoth cavern falls dark. As they untangle themselves from each other, the man mumbles a few meters away. "What a mess." It is silent for another moment, before, the same man whispers "episkey" and a series other unintelligible spells.

"What's going on?" Susan croaks as the silencing spells wears off. "Why isn't he attacking us?"

"I don't know." Neville answers lost in thought. "If it was one of the Carrows, Yaxley, or Snape, we would already be dead."

"I know." She agrees and then adds. "Whoever he is, he can see in the dark."

A moment later, the cave is lit again, this time with a pair of wands on either side of them a few meters off the ground. The pair looks at a tall, cloaked man sitting on a rock in between the two lit wants with the other boy's body lying motionless at his feet.

Neville launches himself yet again at the man bellowing. "If you hurt my friend, I am going kill you!"

"Quiet," the man snarls as he uses a quick sweep of his leg to trip Neville, sending the boy tumbling out of control. A look from his cold, blue eyes, freezes the girl in place.

Neville rolls back over onto his stomach and rises painfully into a kneeling position. "What do you want?"

The man nods. "Listen," he pauses before continuing. "I'm not your enemy. I cannot tell you who I am; but, know this, Dumbledore sent for me before he died to keep an eye on the school during this dark time."

"I don't believe you!" Neville retorts. "Look what you did to my friend!"

Sighing, the man rubs his face for a moment before responding. "Your friend is just asleep. He's badly injured and I need to move him fast and don't have the time to argue."

"Argue?" Susan shyly questions.

The man nods before pointing his finger at the boy lying peacefully on the ground. "None of you is going to like what I am going to say and, to say the least, he has the hardest head."

Neville, even in this situation, cannot prevent a chuckle from escaping his lips. "You're not going to kill us or turn us over to the Death Eaters?"

"No," the man answers. "But, I can't do anything for Ms. Weasley either and you, Mr. Longbottom, have worn out your welcome at Hogwarts."

"I don't understand." The girl queries back.

"The Death Eaters can only identify Ms. Wesley and Mr. Longbottom." The man begins. "Thus, if you and West Ham can keep your mouths shut, you can stay. I'll make-up a story to cover West Ham's injuries, Madame Pomfrey will help, and I can help you get back to your house."

"I am not leaving my friends!" Neville defiantly weighs back in.

Meeting the young man's fierce determination with cold, hard experience, the man retorts. "It's too late for you Mr. Longbottom. You're dead if you stay at Hogwarts."

"Not unless Ginny comes with me!" He fires back.

"She will be guarded by Bellatrix and a half dozen Death Eaters." The man wearily shakes his head. "Not even I can get past that many and escape with her alive. It's too late for Ms. Weasley now."

"I have to do something!" Neville cries out.

For the first time, he notices the boy has no shoes. With a complicated flick of his wand, he catches the gangly boy off-guard as thick, padded moccasins swaddle his ruined feet. "I promise you, I will do whatever I can to help her; but right now, I need to get West Ham to the infirmary, you out of Hogwarts, and your friend to her house before the party you left upstairs comes down here looking for you."

With Neville momentarily stunned looking at his feet, the girl watches the cloaked man wave his wand again as Seamus' body gently rises and slowly moves forward with the man right behind him. "So, we leave Ginny then?"

"I don't like it either." He sadly concurs before mumbling a handful of charms over his shoulder. "Can't have them following our trail."

Falling in line behind the trio, Neville breaks his moment of silence. "Bellatrix will make Ginny pay for stunning her when she rescued me. I know what that bitch can do."

"I know." The man emotionlessly replies as he leads them through the darkness. "Your little rebellion has gotten a lot of attention. A lot of people outside these walls know about it and it's serving as a lightning rod for those opposed to the new Ministry and the Dark Lord."

"Good!" Neville snaps back. "That's the plan."

Susan is lost in thought for a moment before she cries out, "oh, no."

"Yes," the man nods seeing the look in the girl's pleading eyes. "Something happened at Malfoy Manor involving Potter a few days ago and Bellatrix es muy enojado. So, she took it out on Neville yesterday. Now, add in this little adventure. Combined, a chain of events has been set in motion that will not end well for Ms. Weasley. Rumor has it the Minister will pay a visit to Hogwarts by the end of the week and even the Dark Lord may come back from wherever the hell he disappeared to join in the fun."

Susan whimpers. "They are looking to make an example."

"Yes," The man takes a deep breath. "A brutal, and very public example of someone, so that no more of these little rebellions take place."

"And now they are going to go after Ginny." She sobs.

The man nods at her. "Yes, the Carrows and the Ministry doesn't care who they use. Both Ginny and Neville make a good target because of their known friendship with Potter." He takes a moment to further organize his thoughts. "In fact, Ginny's even a better target as the entire Weasley clan has been a royal pain in the ass to the new regime."

"Plus Ginny and…" Susan almost blurts out.

"Shut-up!" Neville interrupts.

She shakes her head. "Like they don't know?" The girl sadly laughs. "Between veritaserum and the two of them snogging in the middle of the Gryffindor common room in front of the entire house last year, it's inevitable that they'll find out."

The man pauses and turns to the pair. "I heard that their relationship was over…"

"Yes, technically speaking. But, they still care A LOT for each other." Susan sadly smiles.

"Yeah," Neville surrenders. "I heard that Harry ended it because he didn't what You-Know-Who to find out."

For a long moment the man is silent before he begins to talk more to himself than to them. "No, the Dark Lord does not know yet. If he did, he would have grabbed her the first day of school. But, you're right, he will find out now and he will use it to his advantage immediately." Pausing he adds, "How can we use that to our advantage?"

"It's obvious." Neville winces. "He'll use Ginny as bait to lure Harry to Hogwarts to rescue her. And we know how successful of a mission that will be with You-Know-Who, all of the Death Eaters, and half of the Ministry waiting for him."

Crying softly, the girl offers an alternate course of action. "Or, he'll just kill Ginny as a way to destroy Harry."

Before the man can think further, a loud boom rumbles its way through the cavern. "Damn, times up." Looking around, he casts a lighted charm down a previously unseen antechamber to their left. "Head down that passage and then climb up the central shaft, they will pop you out in the…"

"Prefects' bathroom," Neville answers in surprise. "We're in the Chamber of Secrets."

Pulling out the girl's wand, he hands it to her. "Close, Ms. Weasley told me about it one day and I took a tour to see if it could be used in case of an emergency."

"What about you three?" Susan asks as the tall man waves his wand above her head and she shivers for a moment.

"Tego texi tectum," the man grumbles before answering. "There, this cloaking charm should last about thirty minutes." Satisfied, he nods his head in the other direction. "Dumbledore added a second route out of the Chamber that lands us close to the Infirmary. I'll drop-off West Ham there and then get Neville out."

Torn between fear and loyalty, the Hufflepuff girl whispers, "how do I know I can trust you?"

"You don't." He smiles under the dark hood. "I had a plan to get Ms. Weasley out of here. It's useless to her now; but I can use it to get Neville to Hogsmeade and from there I can get him in touch with the Order."

Neville turns on them both. "I am not leaving Hogwarts. I am not giving-up."

The man reaches out and squeezes his shoulder. "You are a brave man, Mr. Longbottom. You're parents would be proud." He waits for a moment for the student to collect his composure before continuing. "But, your fate is sealed if you stay here. You will die. And nothing will be gained from it."

"But…" Neville turns away before sobbing.

"Listen," the man adds. "Let me get you safely to Hogsmeade for now and maybe you can talk to the Order about how you can help Hogwarts from the outside."

After a moment, Neville shakes his head in agreement, "OK."

"Good," he smiles sadly before nodding at Susan. "Time to go, senorita."

"Thank you." Susan whispers as she turns to her left and begins to move away as they turn to the right. "Good luck!"