Waking up this time had been decidedly less pleasant than the white purgatory. Even the twitch of his eyes as he stirred awake hurt. Hearing the voices passing by was torture, as was that ringing in his ears. And Merlin help him if he tried to move his head in the slightest. It was only a question of what hurt more: his head or his neck?

Severus immediately began to compare the feeling to a spike being rammed through the back of his head, a physical pain that had been a much more regular occurrence in his younger days, as a student of Hogwarts rather than a menacing teacher.

The whole ordeal, even trying to open his eyes, was more sharp and prolonged than the attack by Nagini. At least THAT had numbed shortly afterward.

Opening his eyes let in that tortuous glare of the sun, and immediately he began to reel, throwing an arm back over his face. If a student had seen him, it would only add to the ridiculous rumors that he was a vampire.

Footsteps began to click on a marble floor, each one blasting through Snape's head like a Reductor Curse to his brain. Louder. LOUDER. LOUDER. This was it. He must have crossed over into hell and begun his eternity of punishment.

"Be careful, Mr. Snape. We don't want to make it worse. Shh...Relax."

The feminine voice sounded familiar, but Severus couldn't place it between the pain and the ringing in his head.

"Turn your head to the side, please." the mysterious woman requested. Not willing to argue, he obeyed, and doing so he noticed a bottle on his bedside. Ringing head or not, Severus immediately recognized it between the teal-colored liquid and the label. A Wide-Eye Potion, designed to prevent sleep, awaken from drugging, or…

"I'm using some Star Grass Salve to help you with the pain. Sadly, there isn't much more we can do for concussions than a Muggle Doctor."

Immediately, Severus felt pressure on the back of his head, which hurt for a brief instant. Suddenly though, a soothing aroma reached his nostrils and a lightheaded numbness spread throughout his senses. It was just enough for him to focus on the voice and be able to place it with the help of his memories.

"Poppy..?" he asked groggily, though he was startled by the youthful voice he heard.

"Excuse me, Mr. Snape. I'll give you some leeway due to the concussion, but the rest of the Hogwarts staff may not hesitate to take points from Slytherin for your disrespect. Please mind your manners."

"Manners?" Severus thought to himself. For nearly two decades, he had been on a first-name basis with everyone at the school of wizardry. Madam Pomfrey, in particular, had been a close acquaintance of his on account of her frequent need of his potion stores for whatever idiotic injuries had been sustained by Neville Longbottom or the notorious pyromaniac Seamus Finnigan.

Two decades.

His eyes widened.

"Excuse me...Madam Pomfrey." Severus croaked, perplexed at hearing a higher-pitched, teenage voice escape his lips again. Just what point in time had he been flung back to? "...What day is it? How long...have I been asleep?"

"Not long. It's still Thursday. We couldn't let you stay unconscious for fear of complicating the injury." the school Matron answered, having finished applying the salve to the growing lump on his head, before turning it back up so that she could face him.

It was one jarring shock after another for Severus; Madam Pomfrey looked far younger than he had seen in years. Her face was almost devoid of wrinkles. The gray hair was still a vibrant blonde. The only thing that he could recognize was her shining, blue eyes.

She gave Severus a warm smile as she took him through his paces. "It looks like your eyes are responding well to the light now."

"What happened?" the teenage boy asked, still dumbfounded.

There it was. The familiar, frustrated scowl he remembered spread on Madam Pomfrey's face. "What happened was you and Mr. Potter got into another barney down by the lake. He had you hoisted up and dropped you squarely on your head. What in Merlin's name goes through your head when you two do this?! I hope you realize that this is going to cut into your O.W.L.s"

Potter...

Lake…

O.W.L.s…

"Feel a point in your life that you wish you could change." Dumbledore's words echoed again.

That was where he had been thrust. His Worst Memory. The moment right before he said…

"How did I get here?" Severus asked suddenly.

"Well, Mr. Potter brought you in on a conjured gurney. It would have been rather impressive magic if he hadn't been the one to leave you like this. Given that he was followed in by Mr. Lupin and Miss Evans, they probably had something to do with convincing him to do the right thing.

Miss Evans.

Severus' breath caught in his throat and his stomach seemed to do flips like it were a bludger at a Quidditch match. The mention of two enemies, Potter and Lupin, didn't seem to matter to him. She was alive. And if nothing else, she still cared enough to help him get treated for a concussion.

His eyes scanned the entirety of the Hospital Wing, looking around desperately. He understood the words that Madam Pomfrey told him, but he didn't dare hope or believe them until he saw her for himself. Despite his search, there was no sign of that fiery mane of red hair, nor those deep, green eyes.

Sensing his urgency, the Matron piped in. "Relax Mr. Snape. They all left before you woke up. Given that it's almost sundown, I imagine that all of them are going to be in the Great Hall soon for dinner."

Hope, followed by disappointment. Two emotions that Severus had not experienced in a very long time. He let out an exhausted sigh, and let his head rest back on the pillow in defeat.

"I'm going to be leaving for supper as well, but it's probably too soon for you to hold down any food without vomiting." The School Healer pointed towards the bottle at his bedside table. "You may rest your eyes, but sleep is too dangerous tonight. I want you to take one sip of that potion every few hours. I'll be back a little while after curfew to give you another application of the salve to keep you calm and relatively pain-free, but you are not to leave the bed for any reason. Is that understood?"

Severus nodded slightly. Madam Pomfrey had been like the mother that had been absent in his life. He remembered during his teenage years how often he would visit the Hospital Wing due to his fights with James Potter. She always had a stern foundation of morals, giving him advice that his younger mind didn't care to hear.

That was how it had always been. Everyone had an agenda. They all had tried to steer him in a certain direction, yet Severus knew from the start what his ambitions were. Strength. Influence. Wealth that his poverty-ridden childhood could never dream of. And above all, acceptance. The only ones he ever listened to were the ones that told him what he wanted to hear. Rather than what he needed to hear. Much like every other impetuous teenager that he had seen come in as wide-eyed first years and leave as fully-grown adult witches and wizards. Advice and thoughtful teaching was as nothing before actual experience and lessons learned by oneself.

He shut his eyes and started to recall the scene that had played in his mind thousands of times. What he would do if he had the power to go back and change that moment. How he would easily disarm Potter and humiliate all four of those wretched Marauders. The popular Quidditch Hero. His sadistic, best friend. Their snivelling tag-along who ratted Lily out to the Dark Lord. And lastly, the Wolf in Sheep's Clothing, too concerned with keeping his friends than to adhere to his responsibilities as a Prefect.

Even now, the thought of those four infuriated Severus. He knew, if he had been dropped into that scene a few minutes earlier, how different things would have gone. And he almost felt cheated out of that moment of glory.

Almost.

None of that mattered, as long as he had at least avoided uttering that wretched word. Even if it meant that he fell on his head like the inept Longbottom boy. He supposed it was better than having his pants stripped by Potter, but it hardly made a difference. For all of the humiliation that his pride had suffered that day, he would endure it all ten times over just for the opportunity to change that one thing.

"But now what?" he thought curiously to himself. "...What can I possibly say if I see her again?"

It was a strange conundrum, to be sure. For almost two decades of spying on Voldemort and the Death Eaters, Severus had been walking a tightrope where one slip would result in his death. Which is why he was so incredibly skilled at it. Because the consequence meant absolutely nothing to him.

Here, if he truly had returned to his teenage years at Hogwarts, if Lily was in fact alive again...the consequence of falling off that tightrope was so laughably mundane compared to the eternity of death. So why was it so jarring to think about what exactly he should say? Why was it so hard to think at all?

"Severus. Feel. Don't think." the words of Dumbledore returned once again to the forefront.

Dumbledore.

Severus opened his eyes again and stared at the ceiling. If he was young again...that meant that the old Headmaster was also alive. Would he remember Severus if they crossed paths again? Would he be expected to resume his duties as a spy in a world where the threat of Lord Voldemort was just beginning to come to a head?

Unlikely. If he were truly reborn into this world, this time, with everything and everyone else set as they had previously been, then the Headmaster would just be a stranger to him now. His one ally that he could be forthcoming with, despite feeling like a broken, well-used tool, was just another face in a sea of uncertainty.

There were so many lingering questions distracting Severus that he had scarcely noticed that night had already fallen amidst his pondering. And that a visitor had wandered in…

"You're awake…" a soft voice whispered, silencing all of the noise and thoughts flooding through his mind.

His eyes remained glued to the ceiling, too terrified to move. That bubbling sensation in his stomach returned tenfold. That voice...it had been so long since he had heard it clearly with his own ears, not dulled and distant as it would be when viewing memories in a Pensieve.

It took nearly all of his strength just for the simple motion to tear his gaze away from the white ceiling of the Hospital Wing...down through the air...past the vibrant, copper curls...and into those bright green eyes. There, standing at his bedside, was Lily, her arms folded, with an obviously frustrated expression on her face.

The reborn teenager's breaths instantly became labored when his mind registered her presence. Within a few seconds, he was hyperventilating, but didn't dare take his eyes off of her for fear that she would disappear. That cauldron was bubbling...and within seconds, its contents burst.

He couldn't keep it in any longer, and his lunch...whatever that had been some twenty-two years ago, was retched onto the floor just a few feet from where Lily had been standing.

"Five-hundred points from Slytherin...for vomiting in front of her before so much as a word was said. Brilliant, Snape." he thought to himself in sheer humiliation.

"God, Severus…" The Muggleborn girl shook her head with disgust and pity, reaching into her pocket and pulling out that unmistakable, willow wand. She pointed it at the wretched bile "Scourgify".

Once the incantation was spoken, numerous soapy bubbles began to scrub and clean at the mess that Severus had made, and within moments, it was gone completely.

Wiping away at his mouth, the young man continued to look up at Lily, with a mixture of awe and frustration at his atrocious first impression. "...What are you doing here?"

The question hadn't been meant as an insult, but clearly the words had struck a nerve as Lily's lips pursed. "To be honest, I'm asking myself the same question right now. I THOUGHT I would come and check up on a friend, but maybe I'm in the wrong place. Are we even friends anymore?"

Please. No. Not again. "...Wha...why on Earth would you ask me that?

"Why wouldn't I? You haven't spoken to me in over a week, you skived off last night when I invited you to study in the library for the Ancient Runes O.W.L., I tried to help you down by the lake, and THAT is the first thing you say to me?"

Merlin, those eyes were capable of burning away the layers of Occlumency, especially when they flared like a pair of enchanted, green flames. His frustration began to grow, and within moments, he was making the same, impulsive comments he did when he actually had been sixteen.

"You came to help me because of that pretty little badge you wear so proudly on your chest!" Severus snapped, pointing at her crimson and gold Prefect's Badge that was shining in the dimly lit room.

Lily gasped, taken aback by his detestable comment. Definitely not the right thing to say. One of his last positive memories of Lily had been the beaming grin on her face when she revealed it to him the summer before fifth year. How proud she was that all her hard work and relentless studying had afforded her more responsibilities. It was a position she took very seriously, and it was little wonder that in less than a year and a half, she'd be the Head Girl of their graduating year.

"No...I came to help you because it was the right thing to do. Because I wanted to try to get your attention one more time! Maybe remind you that I exist? It was more than you deserved, because when I realized you weren't coming to study with me, I passed by the Restricted Section and saw you chatting it up with Avery and Mulciber. What happened? Was the stupid Mudblood not worth your time?"

"DON'T say that word!" Severus winced.

"Why not?! You've said it before, just not to me!" Lily hissed as she stamped her foot on the marble floor

The frustration continued to pour from the girl, weeks, months, no, years of growing anxiety and frustration for her best friend, along with the one thing that he absolutely was not prepared for. He noticed tears beginning to fill her eyes.

"Severus, I can NOT keep doing this to myself! I wanted to help you. You were innocent in that whole ordeal until the moment you flung that spell at Potter."

This wasn't how Severus was expecting or hoping this would go. He had remembered all of the good times he had spent with this girl. Memories that he clung to as the best times he had ever experienced. Memories that were strong enough to conjure a Patronus. Good times...that clearly had not been shared by the two for quite some time, even at this point.

The image returned to his mind. A single visual from the countless times he had gone back and viewed that memory from every conceivable angle. One that still ate away at his sanity, even now.

"Is that why you smiled?" he asked coldly, recalling the brief moment where her lips pursed upward at his predicament.

"Yes." she responded without hesitation. "You could have just let me do my job and you wouldn't have gotten hurt. I was trying to help you, but that wasn't enough. You still had to get your licks in at Potter."

"He humiliated me!"

"I KNOW! And I was the ONLY one who came to help you!" Lily roared back, the tears breaking free and beginning to trickle down her cheeks. "Not Rosier! Not Avery! Not Mulciber! ME!"

The sight of those tears was a sharper punch to the gut than anything Severus had ever endured at James Potter's hands during his years of torment at Hogwarts. How was it that he was still so incompetent when it came to Lily Evans? Hadn't he spent over two decades remembering this horrible day?

"I have made excuses for you for years." she seethed through tear-stained eyes, her frustration palpable and so very familiar to Snape as her words echoed his heartbreaking ending with her at the Fat Lady's Portrait.

Anything but this again...he hadn't even uttered that hateful remark at the lake this time. He had to take back control of this conversation before the divide between them became irreparable again. "Lily, I-"

"No! Listen! For once in your life, listen to me!" she spat with righteous fury. "Do you know what it's like? To defend you for years from my other friends? To tell them that they're wrong about you? That you aren't cruel? That you aren't going to become a Death Eater and join You-Know-Who's side? Of course not! You don't know what that's like because you're too busy rubbing shoulders with people who believe I shouldn't exist!"

Severus could only sit on his hospital bed, stunned at Lily's outburst. He had nothing to say in his defense. Because deep in his heart, he knew everything she spoke was true of the person he had been up to this point. His utterance of that horrible word, Mudblood, had merely been the straw that broke the camel's back.

Lily's eyes, red and puffy from her emotional outburst, lingered on Snape's pitiful form for a moment of uncomfortable silence before letting the rest of it loose. "You promised! Back home in Cokeworth, before we ever came here! It didn't make a difference whether I was Muggleborn or not!"

"It doesn't!" he pleaded to her without hesitation, his eyes, once so stoic and disinterested in his adult years, filled with a childish desperation. It couldn't end like this, not again.

"Bollocks! I couldn't give a Hippogriff's backside what Avery, Mulciber, Rosier, or bloody You-Know-Who himself have to say about me!" she cried. It came rushing back to Severus how outspoken and vulgar Lily could be when she was offended and hurt, a detail forgotten to time and tragedy.

"What I do care about is what kind of person my so-called best friend is turning into. And I'll have no part of it anymore. Not when my worst bloody fear in Defense O.W.L.s today turned out to be you!"

With that biting revelation, Lily turned on her heel and bolted towards the exit of the Hospital Wing with not so much as a word of farewell. And with the sound of the chamber door slamming echoing in the otherwise silent ward, Severus' head bowed forward.

How could he have been so stupid to believe that merely uttering one word, foul or otherwise, had been the only thing to ruin such a wonderful and important friendship? He had chosen his point of return poorly, and with no ethereal form of Dumbledore nearby to plead with to help undo his mistake, all the lonely man could do is stew in his own solitude.

Once again, he had lost Lily Evans' friendship due to the mistakes of his youth...and once again, he couldn't help but feel that they were well-deserved.

Author's Note: Surprise! I know it's been literally years since the last time I touched this story, but I have never forgotten about it. And now that I'm older, I want to go back over it and finally push through to get it just the way I want. You may notice similarities between this and the previous version of Viridi's chapter, but despite the common beginning, story elements are going to diverge and hopefully carry a lot more weight than they did previously. I'm hoping once I venture into uncharted territory that my changes in writing style become more apparent.

To those that choose to come back and give me your attention as you did years ago, I thank you so much for your patience and your waiting. I think I can finally approach my take on the whole "Severus back in time" fanfiction idea with my own flavor. As always, I'd like to shout out the wonderful and consistently updated "The Peace Not Promised" by Tempest Kiro as my inspiration for continuing on with this. As I read their story, I can't help but think to myself "They keep updating, they keep writing, so why don't you?" Well here it is. Hopefully fans of Tempus Vita and Viridi will be happy with what I can deliver. As always, please let me know your thoughts in the review section! It always helps keep the motivation high!