Time is a curious thing. Sometimes as much as you want it to it refuses to stop. It travels on, not stopping to care about how it is affecting people's lives.

So, as much as Alice did not want to turn seventeen, the date of her birthday, May 5, had arrived and she was celebrating it outside, without her boyfriend. Sure, she had her friends, but it was times like these when she missed Frank the most.

The girls put a huge effort into trying to make her birthday the most normal it could be. Usually, there was the last Hogsmeade visit on her birthday and after spending their entire day there, the girls would talk to each other into the early hours of the morning. Since the attack that happened, Dumbledore canceled the Hogsmeade visit for their safety.

Here the four of them were sitting on a blue blanket with the food they collected from the Kitchens. A large oak tree provided them shade from the rather harsh sun that presented itself.

The boys told them they would join them later and while Lily let it slide, she saw the mischievous grins on each of their faces.

"Alice, I'm going to throw this strawberry at you and you have to catch it in your mouth," Mary picked up a handful of strawberries and got ready to throw them to Alice.

...

The Marauders each carried a bucket. James and Sirius had a bucket of glue. Remus and Peter each had a bucket of hot pink glitter.

Their plan was to run up from behind the girls, dump the glue onto them, and then pour the glitter over top of them. Little did they know, Minnie was watching them run down the corridor and had a plan of her own.

"AGH! Merlin, what happened?" James tripped over what looked like nothing, sending the glue everywhere. Including, his fellow Marauders.

"I think you got some in my mouth," Remus spit on the ground, not happy because he had lost his grip on the bucket he had been holding, sending glitter all over the corridors.

"Here are four mops boys," Minnie appeared behind them, carefully stepping around the glue and glitter covered cobblestones. "I'll let it slide if you clean the mess up."

"Bloody hell Prongs, I did not want to spend my day off cleaning the corridors," Sirius complained.

"I was not the only one that spilled glue everywhere. If I remember correctly, I recall you tripping as well."

So, the girls sat and waited on a blue blanket for four boys that didn't show up.

...

Minerva was on her way to an Order meeting that Dumbledore had called in his office when she had seen the four troublemaking boys. His office had been enlarged to fit all the members in it because it was mandatory for everyone not on a mission to attend.

She showed up five minutes late, which was unusual for her, people being tardy was one of her biggest pet peeves. In result, Minnie was never late if she could help it. Mentally cursing the Marauders in her head, she took a seat next to a twenty-eight year old, Kingsley Shacklebolt.

Shacklebolt had once been a student of McGonagall's, to think he would be sitting next to her as an equal was crazy because even if he was sitting next to her at a meeting they were both attending, it still felt as if she was his superior. Minerva just had an aura of responsibility, of superiority that never faded, even if you were her superior.

"I called this meeting to address future missions members sitting here will be going on." Dumbledore spoke at a steady pace, so he didn't have to repeat himself, saying it once was hard enough. "First, my brother, Aberforth, you will be corresponding with Fleamont and Euphemia because of their ties with the Ministry. Please keep the two boys out of it, hard as it may prove to be."

"Two boys?" Shacklebolt asked.

"Yes, James and Sirius. I guess we covered that in a meeting you were absent from. The Potter's have two sons." McGonagall answered briskly in a way that made Shacklebolt feel stupid.

"Next, Michael, Myles and Marcus McKinnon will be following clues to figure out where the Death Eater base is. Eve and Darwin will also be on this case. We don't usually send entire families out on one case, but the five of them work incredibly together. Deflect any questions Marlene may ask you."

The three brothers shared a look, Marlene was terribly stubborn in getting what she wanted, so it would be hard trying to keep her off their trail. Darwin covered a laugh up with a cough and Eve elbowed him in hopes she wouldn't laugh as well.

"The last upcoming mission is for Minerva. She will be searching for the object we spoke previously about at Henry Smith's home. He is also Lily Evans's mother's boyfriend, so this one is top priority. We have reasons to believe the object in which Minerva is searching for is about to be moved. Kingsley and his fellow aurors will always be on-call should something happen."

It all sounded far too grim for Minnie, missions mixing with students always managed to make her feel uneasy.

As the meeting continued on she had more and more negative thoughts. Sometimes fighting a war against people who kill whoever they want gets tiring and seems like a lost cause. Yet, if ever asked, Minnie would instill hope that they could and would win the war.

...

Alice's mood had been put out on their rather long walk up to the dormitories, it wasn't going to make anyone's mood that had a boyfriend training in a far away place better. Marlene and Mary didn't bother to filter themselves. No matter how much Lily tried, she couldn't get the curse words to stop coming out of their mouths and shortly she joined them in going through every letter of the alphabet saying an offensive word.

When they found the common room empty, minus a few first-years, it was Alice's turn to let out a string of curse words. Her feet were killing her and she could care less about the horrified stares she received.

"Nice one Alice. Now, where are the damn Marauders?" Mary sat down on the couch and nudged a first-year to ask if she could have a chocolate frog. Lily rolled her eyes when Marlene and her split the one they had been given.

"I'll go check their dorm, but if I somehow get pranked it's all your guys's fault," Lily was about to turn and walk up the stairs, but the boys in question slid down the stairs railing.

"No offense, but where the fuck have you been? You're severely late!" Marlene eyed the four of them while Alice and Lily took a seat next to their friends.

"Is that a chocolate frog? I thought Evans ate the last one like yesterday," Sirius said completely ignoring the question.

"Mary stole it from a first-year. Now, I am bored, aren't you four known for your ability to make people un-bored?" Alice mused.

"I did not steal! I would never steal!" Mary looked very affronted to be accused of such a thing.

"Are we both forgetting two summers ago at-" Marlene started.

The story that was about to be told would out a number of things that were illegal and Remus seemed to know that, so he jumped in to Mary's rescue. Which wouldn't go unnoticed by Alice, she hadn't brought it up again, but she wasn't going to forget Mary's stupid grin the other night.

"Alright, alright. We couldn't make it to Alice's picnic because of a prank gone wrong. We had to clean up or face detention."

"We are known for our ability to make the party live again. So, why don't we play a game of truth or dare?" James asked, grinning again with mirth and that special twinkle in his eyes. Lily was too tired to remember the warnings of playing that particular game with the Marauders, so she stood up and clasped her hands together.

"Fine. You four can go get food and drinks and stuff from the Kitchens. Meet us up in our dorm."

...

Thirty minutes, almost being caught by Mrs. Norris twice and many curses later, the Marauders had found their way up the girls staircase. Don't ask how, they'll never tell.

Lily was exasperated by the amount of protests the girls had given when faced with the choice of playing truth or dare with the Marauders. Even Marlene, who had definitely played the game with them more than once, was not siked.

"Nope. The last time I played truth or dare with those blokes I had to kiss Sirius and that was before I liked him."

"Marly, didn't you tell me you liked him like a week later?" Lily inquired, one eyebrow raised.

"Not the point. At the time, it was not something I wanted to do," Marlene countered from her spot next to Lily on her bed. They had laid next to each other while Alice took a shower and Mary took shelter on her own bed.

"Mary, you look deep in thought. Whatcha thinkin' about?" The two of them craned their necks to see her fidgeting with her tie.

"I've noticed how I don't really know, know the boys like you two and Alice do. Maybe, this game will give me a chance to learn some things about them."

Many things suddenly happened at once. Alice came out of the bathroom, steam following her and the Marauders entered, each one carrying something.

"The party has arrived!" Sirius boomed.

"Yeah, if you mean Alice," Mary retorted.

The eight of them sat down, some more enthusiastically than others. Mary had finally decided to remove her tie and draped a blanket around her shoulders. She smiled softly at Remus and when the smile was returned she couldn't help but laugh internally at herself.

Lily and Marlene quite literally rolled off the bed onto the hard floor. As they fell onto the floor Lily was slightly crushed by Marlene, but did not complain because the latter would definitely point out that Lily was making her play a game she didn't want to.

Alice sat down gracefully on Mary's opposite side next to Peter as well. James and Sirius set down the food and drinks they had carried in the center of the circle and sat down in between Remus and Peter. When they had settled, Marlene was next to Remus and Lily was next to Mary.

"Are there any special rules to playing this game with you guys?" Lily asked.

"You've never played with us before?" She shook her head no. "Unbelievable, unbelievable."

"Not really Sirius, we were annoying little shits," James earned a slap on his arm from Sirius for that.

"Still are," then Sirius proceeded to slap Remus as well. "Just think about it for a moment. You two went around hexing people for your entertainment. How can you expect someone to not find that annoying?"

"Fair point, but wise as you are I really want to play this game," James tried to change the subject.

"Alright, who's going first?" Mary asked, growing bored of the last topic anyways.

"I will! I choose Red," Sirius looked Lily straight in the eyes and unsurprisingly she stared straight back. "Truth or dare?"

"Dare."

"Your decision might've been incredibly brave or stupid, those two things are so close you'll never be able to tell the difference."

"Thanks for your vote of confidence, Ali."

"I dare you to skinny dip in the Black Late," as soon as the words left his mouth Lily laughed extremely loud.

"How are you supposed to know that I completed the dare?"

"Simple. Marlene goes down with you, taking an extra set of clothes and a towel with her. You use the towel to dry yourself off and the clothes to change into after the dare is done.

"After the dare is over and you come up here, we'll know you completed it if you come up with the dry clothes your wearing now, a wet towel and wet hair." It seemed like he had thought of the rules of the dare before, but nobody wanted to question it.

"And I guess while you complete it, we will be up here continuing the game." James finished.

Marlene stood up and pulled a towel out of the bathroom closet. Then, she walked over to Lily's dresser and pulled out what appeared to be another outfit. She held out her hand for her to take and off they went.

...

The game continued fifteen minutes later even with the two girls still not having shown up. Most of damage control was usually done by Lily and without her there, messes were made, drinks were spilled.

That wasn't the problem though. The problem was that they had ran out of the pumpkin juice —the house-elves, though incredibly polite, declined their wish for fire whiskey—So, while it was inconvenient Peter had spilled the remainder of the drink, messes were ultimately a fact of life.

So, here you find Mary and Remus, the ones who were elected for the job, walking stealthily to the Kitchens for more drinks. They had been elected because both of them had taken their turns in the game.

Remus and Mary were betting on how long it took for their friends to burn the dorm down. They had just moved on from what would most likely eat Lily while she was in the lake.

That left Alice, Peter, James and Sirius in the dorm, so they paused the game for a bit. Casually talking about normal teenage things was good for them too.

...

Lily and Marlene had made it down to the Black Lake without a hitch. Nobody else seemed to want to be out in the corridors at midnight, which wasn't a problem for the two girls. The less people who witnessed them walking down the corridors the better.

Once Lily actually saw the lake she started to laugh. I am actually going through with this. Screw you Sirius Black. However much she didn't want to do it, Lily started to undress.

"I can't believe how many rules you've broken this year. Like actually though! Last year you broke curfew occasionally, but it seems like you're breaking a rule everyday!" Marlene smiled and sat down on the long green grass that desperately needed cut.

"I'm sort of surprised myself too. Ever since I pulled that prank with the boys, I've found a thrill in breaking the rules. It's weird and feels unnatural."

Lily took a running leap into the lake. When she was fully submerged in the water, she regretted her decision only a little bit. While the water was cold and she had goosebumps, her adrenaline was pumping at an all time high.

"No, I think not wanting to break the rules is more unnatural. I mean, take Elijah Fenwick for example, complete opposite of his brother by the way, I've never seen him break a rule. Like ever."

She handed the towel to her friend that had just gotten out of the lake. It wasn't too hard of a dare, the walk was just a bit time consuming.

"People probably say the same thing about me. When have I ever broken rules in the public eye?" Lily dried herself off and took the outfit Marlene had picked from her dresser.

"True, but still I like his brother way better than him and that's saying something."

"Wasn't the only reason you liked Fenwick because he was hot? I remember him being really annoying and letting the Marauders get away with things they shouldn't have." Lily replied and threw the towel back at Marlene.

"That makes me sound sort of shallow, but yes that's why he's better than Elijah. And it's not like you don't let the Marauders get away with things."

They started their trek back up to the castle. Expectations for their walk were the same for their walk down, but then they saw people starting to come out of the castle. The two girls didn't notice this though and just kept walking.

"What do I let them get away with?" Lily asked, mildly stunned Marlene took that point of view.

"Oh, I don't know, how about running around once a month as illegal animagi?"

Before Lily could respond, they ran into four people. Marcus. Myles. Michael. And Benjy.

"What are you two doing outside?" Myles asked, seriously concerned about them.

"More importantly, what are you two doing outside?" Michael asked, also seriously concerned for their well-being.

"Am I supposed to know them?" Benjy was confused as to who they were talking to. Why would all three of them know people still in Hogwarts.

"If you came around more often you would know them. That's Marlene and Lily Evans." Marcus snarkily added. He narrowed his eyes at the wet towel in his sister's arms.

"Wow, that's little Marly. Well, they appear to be a little preoccupied with whatever this is, so let's just leave them to it," Benjy started to walk the other way, slightly dragging Michael and Myles with him.

As soon as they were out of sight, the two girls shared a look and then promptly burst out laughing.

"Let's go before McG finds us out here."

...

What they didn't know was that Marlene's brothers were some of the few people that were dismissed from the Order meeting. They didn't even know there was an Order meeting going on.

Minnie was not one of them. She was still sitting in a chair, in an enlarged version of Dumbledore's office. They were discussing the worst case scenarios, which was making the professor even more concerned for June 20. She would have the summer to scope out the house and try to complete the mission.

...

Author's Note:
I really meant for the update to come out a while ago, but here it is! The past few chapters have been pretty quiet about the war/Minnie's mission, so I wrote about it a bit in this one.

I have the following chapter planned, yet not written... I usually at least have a start, but I wasn't sure how to start it. Anyways the next update might take longer as well.

Any song/music suggestions? I'm looking to mix things up a bit.

Lmao anyways thanks for reading
-teddy👽