A/N: Here's chapter two for you. I'm attempting to update weekly, but this one caused me a little difficulty. I had to figure out exactly how much to set up this early, so I had to do a few rewrites on it. I think this is the third draft of it, actually. I hope you like it.

Disclaimer: Have we not been over this? Must I give another 'I'll own Harry Potter when' spiel? Oh, alright then. Ahem. I'll own Harry Potter when the Dolores Umbridge adopts Harry Potter.

An Army of Our Own

Chapter Two: Burning Memories

The havoc that ensued the next morning when everyone was trying to round up all their possessions and schoolbooks was highly reminiscent of the times Harry had experienced at the Burrow during his own school years. Everything seemed to be in utter chaos. James was caught trying to persuade Lily's Pygmy Puff, Remy, into the same cage as his owl, Orion, who had been eyeing the purple puffball ever since Lily had brought it home from her uncle's joke shop. Rose was running about the house in a complete frenzy trying to locate all of her schoolbooks, which had mysteriously hidden themselves in odd places during the night. They were turning up under sofas, in cabinets and different appliances, and, even once, in a toilet.

After snatching Remy back from James and stowing him safely in his own cage, Lily could be found pacing around the guest room where she slept while visiting her cousins. She was muttering to herself, tacking items off a list in her head and trying to think of anything she had forgotten. She came up with nothing, but was still left with the strange feeling there was something she hadn't remembered.

"Hey, Lils," a voice said from the doorway and Lily spun around to find Hugo standing there. "Have you seen Rose's Transfiguration text? She's going completely spare trying to find it; it's the only one she's missing."

Lily shook her head. "I haven't seen it anywhere. I can help find it, though. I've already finished packing."

She stepped out into the hall. Hugo gave the landing a once over before looking at her and saying "You check up here. I'll go and look downstairs again."

He made his way back down the staircase, where quite a ruckus seemed to be breaking out. Lily could hear Rose screeching something and the distinct popping and snapping of a Weasley's Wildfire Whiz-Bang echoing off the walls.

She made her way through all of the bedrooms on the second floor. She didn't find the Transfiguration book in Hugo's room (though, admittedly she hadn't tried too hard. The room really was a wreck and she was almost positive she'd stumbled across an extremely aged banana in the far corner), or Rose's room, which was much neater than Hugo's by far. All the books she could find in the room were sorted neatly onto shelves alphabetically by subject, and none of them seemed to be the one she needed.

She exited Rose's bedroom, causing the nameplate on it to swing slightly as she shut the door, and made her way over to the office Ron and Harry shared when they were working on the same cases. Normally, none of the children were allowed in this room as all Auror work was classified and top secret, but she figured her father wouldn't mind so much if she just checked for the book and then left; they were already running short on time and if this book wasn't found soon, they'd miss their train for sure. It wasn't as if she was going to go snooping through their files or anything. Taking a deep breath, she turned the shiny handle on the door, pushed it open, and stepped inside.

The office was rather cluttered. There were two desks, both littered in manila folders and fly away papers with a waste bin beside each one. Crumpled papers and discarded sweet wrappers overflowed from the bins onto the floor. Numerous books lined the shelves on the walls, all with titles like Helpful Hex Index and The Dark Arts: Evaluated and Outsmarted. Lily ran a finger over the heavy leather spines of the books, checking the titles for Rose's Transfiguration text, but finding nothing. She turned her attention back to the desks, each of which had a small, wooden block amongst the plethora of papers that had both Harry's and Ron's names on them along with their rank in the Auror office.

As Lily studied her father's desk, finding no trace of a book anywhere on it, she noticed something there that she hadn't immediately taken in upon first glance. A stone basin sat in the middle of the desk, crushing several scrolls of parchment. The basin had odd marking around the top edges and seemed to be giving off a faint, bluish glow. Curious, Lily approached it and peered inside. It was filled with a substance that she could not define as either liquid or gas and she noticed a set of phials next to it, all containing a similar substance and donning small labels.

She reached out for one of the phials and lifted it. The label on it read 'Tottenham Court Road; Thursday, August the First, 1997'. There were small figures moving in the murky substance floating in the glass, though she couldn't make them out. She replaced the phial gingerly into the small wooden stand it was held in with the others and peered once again into the strange basin beside them. She gasped.

There were people in the basin moving very quickly and obviously shouting, though she could not hear what they were saying. The room they were in seemed rather dark and she moved her face closer to the basin to get a better look. There was a desk in the room but, unlike Ron's and Harry's desks in the room she was currently standing in, it had nothing upon its wooden surface. There was also a bookcase which was filled with large, leather bound tomes.

Turning her attention to the people in the room, she recognized a few of them as members of her own family, though far younger in age then she had ever seen them. Her father, at least a head shorter and with his hair as messy as ever, was standing next to Hermione and Neville Longbottom, a close personal friend of her parents'. They all had rather panicky expressions on their faces, and after a moment, she understood why.

Two men in deep black robes with masks over their faces burst into the room and shot a spell at the three of them. Lily's hands flew to her mouth as she watched her father, aunt, and close friend fly backward. Neville was thrown over a desk while Hermione's body slammed into the bookcase, causing all the large books to fall on top of her. Lily's father was knocked into the stone wall behind him. Soon, all the small figures in the basin were firing off curses. Hermione crawled out from under all the large books covering her. Harry shot a curse at one of the masked men, who immediately fell facedown onto the floor.

She saw the three of them pause, and then Hermione began to speak. She had hardly started her sentence before a long whip of purple flame shot out of the wand of the masked man that Harry hadn't cursed and slashed straight through her chest. She toppled over.

"No!" Lily yelled, clutching the edges of the basin with her hands so hard her knuckles turned white.

"Lily?"

Lily whipped around quickly, stepping away from her father's desk as though it had shocked her, and came face to face with her father in the present. She was surprised, at first, at his appearance and realized she had expected to see his younger self from the strange substance in the basin. His more aged face looked very anxious as he looked from his daughter to the basin on his desk.

"What are you doing in here? It's nearly time to leave," he said, striding over to the basin and peering inside. His head turned toward her so fast she was surprised he didn't get whiplash.

"Did you look at this?" he asked, his features turning rather stern.

"Er, well maybe a bit of it…" Lily admitted, staring down at her feet. "I just came in because Hugo asked me to help find Rose's Transfiguration book and-"

"And you thought it would be Ron's and my office?" he asked skeptically.

"Well, no," Lily said, "but they've been cropping up in odd places all morning, it was possible. And it was nowhere in her or Hugo's room, so I just thought I'd check. Then I saw that-that thing on your desk and I just looked at it. I'm sorry."

Harry's face softened somewhat and he took out his wand and touched it to the inside of the basin. A bead of light welled up at the tip of it, and he placed it at the top of an empty phial in the wooden holder on the desk, which immediately filled with the bright substance from the basin.

"It's alright," he said, turning back to Lily. "I just wish you hadn't seen that. It's not one of my better memories."

"Memories?" Lily said. "You mean those things, the phials, they're full of memories?"

"Yes. Mostly mine, Ron's, and Hermione's," Harry said. "But there are a few from a couple other people as well. That particular one was from my fifth year at Hogwarts."

Lily couldn't help but notice how dark her father's face became. It reminded her of the look he got whenever he spoke of the war that had plagued his childhood.

"What happened, Dad?" she asked, quietly.

He looked at her for a moment and smiled sadly.

"Nothing you need to worry about right now," he said. "But Lily, I have to ask you to do something for me."

"What?" Lily asked, surprised at the sudden change of his tone.

"Don't tell anyone what you saw in there. It's all supposed to be secret. Especially don't mention it to your mother. She'd have a fit over me keeping this thing out in the open."

"What exactly is it?" Lily asked, running her fingers along the symbols at the top of the basin.

"It's called a Pensieve," Harry said. "It's used to reflect on certain memories. It's hard for me to remember details from certain situations, so I use this to look back on them."

"But…what was that? What happened to Aunt Hermione?"

Harry's features darkened once more and it seemed to take him a great deal of effort to answer her.

"Someone cursed her," he said finally. "She was okay, though. Madam Pomfrey fixed her up."

"But who was-"

"I can't tell you anymore, Lily. This is all supposed to be kept secret," Harry said quickly. "And anyway, we need to get moving. You'll miss the train if we don't leave soon. Come on, I'll help you with your trunk."

Lily had about fifty more questions, but the look on her father's face told her the conversation was over, so she sighed and reluctantly followed him out of the room.

When Harry and Lily made their appearance downstairs in the hallway, they discovered that Rose had finally managed to procure her Transfiguration book. It turned out this particular volume had wedged itself in between the refrigerator in the kitchen and the wall and was very reluctant to leave its hiding place. James especially had found the sight of Rose yanking and pulling her book out from behind the fridge, pleading with it to come out and get into her trunk, extremely amusing. His obnoxious laughter was stifled at once after a particularly sharp look from his mother. Ginny, it seemed, had an idea as to why the books had decided on the sudden game of hide-and-seek.

With much difficulty and after a few choice swear words from the adults and children alike, the heavy trunks were packed one by one into the extended trunk of the Weasley family vehicle. As they all piled into the car, Hermione cast a nervous glance at Ron as he took the driver's seat.

"Oh, come off it," he said, throwing a glance at her as he pushed the gear shift, "I've had my Muggle license for years now."

He let out a loud yell as his foot pushed the accelerator and sent them all shooting backward. Grumbling to himself, he switched gears again and set off, ignoring Hermione's smug look.

They were about halfway to King's Cross station when Lily let out a loud squeal.

"Oh no, oh no, I've forgotten something!" she said, bouncing up and down in her seat next to James. "It's really important, could we go back? Please?"

Once they'd made it back to the house (after much grumbling and muttered swears on Ron's part), Lily made a mad dash inside, nearly tripping over the uneven ground of the yard, and returned moments later holding absolutely nothing.

"But you didn't even bring anything out!" James exclaimed, looking at her empty hands. Lily ignored him, but Harry thought he saw the edge of a familiar piece of parchment sticking out of her pocket in the rearview mirror.

They arrived at the station at a quarter to eleven and rushed to load their things onto large metal trolleys before each of them took it in turns to pass through the barrier between platforms nine and ten. Harry rushed through with Rose and Albus, Ginny with Hugo and James, and Ron and Hermione entered last with Lily.

Once on the platform, Lily automatically found her best friend, Kayla Messing, standing by her parents and waved eagerly. She had bright, blonde hair that hung around her face in frizzy curls and she was half a head shorter than Lily. Kayla was Lily's first friend at Hogwarts, aside from her brothers and cousins. She was a Muggle-born, which was what had drawn her and Lily together in the first place. On her first day at Hogwarts, Lily had been rather nervous. She'd of course been looking forward to attending the magical school her entire life after hearing about the adventures her parents and brothers had gotten into there, but she feared how much she had to live up to.

Not only did she have two older brothers who had both already made their mark upon the teachers, James with his practical jokes and trouble-making and Albus with his book smarts, but she also had two incredibly famous parents. Being the daughter of Harry Potter, the man who defeated the darkest wizard to ever live, and Ginny Weasley, the best Chaser the Holyhead Harpies had ever had, was a difficult thing to do. While Lily was extremely proud of both of her parents' accomplishments, she wished people could look at her without instantly thinking of them.

That's why it had been such a relief meeting Kayla. Her Muggle parentage resulted in her knowing very little about Quidditch teams and Wizarding history, which suited Lily perfectly. The two had shared the same compartment on the train and talked the whole trip through. They discussed everything from Kayla's parents to Lily's brothers, and, eventually, once the train ride had almost reached its end, Lily told Kayla who her parents were and what they had done. Kayla's initial reaction had been wonder and shock, especially when Lily explained her father's troubled childhood, but it hadn't changed a thing about the way she had treated her before she found out.

As Lily was in the same year as her cousin Hugo, he had also met Kayla and the three of them were typically spotted together in the corridors and always partnered up in classes. Lily sometimes got the sneaking suspicion that her company was less what Hugo hung around with them for than Kayla's was, but she never said anything. Whenever she caught Hugo gazing in a rather dreamy fashion at their friend, she merely raised her eyebrows at him, which never failed to make his ears to turn a very deep shade of scarlet.

Kayla caught sight of Lily from the other end of the platform and waved back at her, beaming.

"Alright, kids, have a great term," Ginny said, leaning down to hug and kiss them all. James dramatically wiped his cheek when she reached him.

"We want letters from you all once a week," Hermione said as she hugged Rose. "Tell us everything that's going on."

"And behave yourselves," Harry put in, looking at James and Albus who grinned.

"Wasting your breath there, mate," Ron said gleefully. "They're almost as bad as we were."

"Well, then let's hope they got more genes from me and Hermione than you two," Ginny said. Harry and Ron both feigned looks of offence at this, causing all of them to laugh.

Harry and Ron helped haul all their luggage onto the train and slammed the doors after they boarded.

"Remember what we said about behaving," Ginny said, stepping back as a loud whistle filled the air and the train began to move.

"And stay safe!" Hermione squeaked, waving at them as the train picked up speed. They waved back at her until the train rounded a corner and their parents were blocked from sight.

"Well, Al and I have some important business to take care of," James said with a maniacal grin. "We'll be seeing you all later…"

And he and Albus disappeared up the corridor. Lily turned to Hugo.

"Let's go and find Kayla," she said, shoving her way past a group of fifth years standing outside a full compartment.

They walked along the train all the way to the back, peering in windows in search of Kayla. They had no luck until almost the back of the train, where they finally spotted her alone in a compartment, sorting through a deck of Muggle playing cards, a book opened on the seat next to her, and murmuring to herself. Hugo slid the door open and sidled inside, Lily following just behind him.

"Oh, hi guys," Kayla said, looking up from her book. "I was wondering where you were, so I just found a compartment. I've been trying to figure out card reading." She nodded to the book next to her. Lily sat in the seat beside her and lifted the cover to see the title. It was Unfogging the Future by Cassandra Vablatsky.

"I take it you signed up for Divination this year?" Lily said.

Kayla nodded, immersed once more in the thick text. She sat a few cards face down on her knees, glanced at the book, and then turned one of them face-up and scowled. "That just can't be right!" she moaned, putting the cards back into the deck and shuffling once more.

"I don't see why you're even bothering with that subject," Hugo said. "Mum and Dad said they took it with Harry when they were here and it was complete rubbish. The teacher's apparently a total fraud."

"From what I've heard, your mom walked straight out of class in the middle of the lesson," Lily said.

"I don't really blame her, to be honest," Hugo said, nodding to Kayla who had just tapped the deck of cards with her wand, causing them to shoot straight into her face.

"Not a word," Kayla murmured as she spat the queen of hearts out of her mouth. Lily stifled her sniggers with much difficulty and Hugo grinned.

The rest of the morning passed, quickly giving way to the afternoon. When the food trolley came, Lily, Hugo, and Kayla bought as many sweets and cakes as they could hold and ate them happily as they watched the rolling green hills pass by outside the window. As they were swapping Chocolate Frog cards and discussing the new classes they had elected to take this term at Hogwarts, the door to their compartment opened rather sharply and James and Albus entered, looking thoroughly irritated. James walked swiftly to Lily and snatched a Frog off of the small stack of remaining sweets next to her, unwrapped it, and shoved it into his mouth whole.

"You owe me a Sickle for that," Lily said as she thumbed through her cards. James disregarded her.

"Three guesses as to who we just ran into in the hall," he said, plopping himself on an empty seat.

"Who?" Hugo asked.

"Scorpius Malfoy," Albus said with a scowl.

"I was about to say that!" James burst out in annoyance. Albus ignored him.

"He said he was amazed our parents would let their 'ickle kiddies' come back to school all alone during such 'troubled times'."

Lily and Hugo looked at each other. Kayla looked puzzled.

"What does he mean by 'troubled times'?" she asked, looking at each of their somber faces in turn.

"Well, we sort of heard something over the summer…"

They explained about the conversation they'd overheard the Order having about the rogue Death Eater and their suspicions as to what the Death Eater was after. When they'd finished, she looked flabbergasted.

"So you think he's after you guys?" she said in amazement. "But…but the war's been over for over twenty years now! If he was going to try and attack you, don't you think he'd've tried something before now?"

James' eyes widened. They hadn't thought of that.

"Maybe something's changed," he suggested. "Is there anything that's happened recently that would make an old Death Eater come out of hiding?"

Everyone was entirely silent, thinking hard. Lily tried to think of anything that could possibly be so appealing a Death Eater would risk his freedom to get it. She considered for a moment the possibility that he could be after what had ended the war, her father himself, but the thought made her shudder and she pushed it from her mind. That wasn't a recent event. It had happened years ago. This Death Eater, whoever he was, had had plenty of time to plan, and even enact, an attack of her father and he hadn't even tried before.

Then she remembered something. She remembered a person whom she had seen only this morning. She remembered a long chain of purple fire, slashing through her aunt's chest. She recalled the labeled phials in the stand beside the mysterious Pensieve. Maybe they weren't all just memories of events. Maybe they were memories of a person.

Memories of a Death Eater.

A/N: I had issues knowing whether I should stop this chapter where I did or not. I had originally planned to keep it going until they reached the common room after the feast, but my word count was getting well up and I figured I should save some of it for the next chapter. The good news about that is the next chapter will most likely be out quicker than this one was, since I already have part of it written.

Oh, and also, I threw an OC in here because it seems highly unlikely that the kids would only hang out with each other while at school, especially since they're all in different years. I kept Hugo and Lily together because I thought they may have established quite a bond, both being the youngest in their families. I also did it because I wanted a sort of echo of the trio from the original series.

And please forgive any spelling or grammar mistakes. I reread the story myself to try and catch them but, as I don't have a beta for this yet, some of them slip through.

Anyway, enough of this huge author's note.

Reviews prevent spattergroit.