With all of the spells flying about the Great Hall, Hermione hardly notices when one of them collides with the time turner that hangs from her neck. Under any other circumstances, she would drop everything and run to make sure that nothing is wrong with it, that it's still functioning properly. As it is, however, she doesn't notice, so she doesn't run to make sure that nothing is wrong.
In the chaos, she does not notice the time turner, but she does see Ron and Ginny, on the far side of the hall. They are fighting opposite two death eaters—one of whom she recognizes from their invasion of Hogwarts last year—and they look to be losing.
As she watches, a curse hits Ginny square in the chest and knocks her backward. She lands on her back and doesn't stir. Ron follows this movement with his eyes wide, his jaw slack, and promptly turns back to the two death eaters with renewed anger, firing curses at the both of them which they easily deflect.
Disregarding everything, Hermione begins to run toward Ron. A curse whistles past her ear, but it in no way fazes her.
A hand reaches out and grabs her, gripping her arm and holding tight. "Hermione."
She meets Remus' gaze. He is staring straight at her, but she feels as though he isn't even seeing her, not really. "Not now Remus, I'm trying to—"
"No, Hermione, listen to me. I think something—" His eyes fall to the time turner. "Why've you got that?"
"I've been using it for my classes. Remus, I need to go help Ron, I'm sorry!" Hermione wrenches her arm out of his grasp, running again.
Remus calls after her, "Be careful! Don't use your—" His voice is drowned out by the shouts, tuned out because she's so intent on reaching Ron as the death eaters are backing him into a corner.
Bellatrix appears directly in front of her, eyes shining and a wild grin on her face. "Running away, are we?"
Hermione looks past Bellatrix in desperation but cannot flee. She lets out a forced laugh. "Never."
"That's a good girl." She shoots a blast of red light Hermione's way, so quickly that she only barely has time to cast a shield charm. Attacking again and again, and Hermione can still see Ron struggling, still see Ginny on the floor, and in the blink of an eye she loses all patience for this. She looks down at the time turner and, before she can lose her resolve, she grabs it and dodges out of the way of another curse, giving it two turns as she moves. If she can't help Ron this time, she'll just have to go back and go through this all again.
She trips, and as she falls toward the floor, everything fades to black. Bellatrix shouts after her, and everything fades to black.
"—reckon she ended up here?"
"That's what everyone's wondering, isn't it? Dumbledore's certainly eager to hear her side of the story."
Hermione feels like she just fell from the top of the North Tower, and even as she slowly regains consciousness, she is under the distinct impression that the pain accompanying any sort of movement will be overwhelming. She will delay it, she thinks, for as long as possible.
It appears, unfortunately, that she has little choice in the matter. The voices around her quiet, and someone whispers, "Is it just me, or—"
"I think she's awake."
The room falls silent, and the anticipation in the air is palpable as Hermione opens her eyes at last.
"Harry!"
She realizes her mistake almost as soon as the word leaves her mouth, but the boy standing above her frowns. "Harry who?"
"N-never mind, you just… you look like someone I know." Because Harry's eyes are green, and this boy's are brown. Besides that, though, the resemblance really is remarkable.
Even from Hermione's limited vantage point, she feels almost certain that she's lying in the hospital wing at Hogwarts. The boy who looks like Harry is not the only person at her bedside—a bit behind him is a second boy, and on her other side is another who looks far more battered and tired than the first two. He also happens to be looking down at Hermione with the most concern apparent in his eyes; the other two boys are clearly just curious.
What have they got to be curious about?
"Did you hear that, Prongs? The girl lying under you called out someone else's name." Prongs?
The Harry doppelganger elbows the boy beside him. "Shut it, Padfoot."
Hermione bolts up into a sitting position, an action she regrets immediately when pain shoots through her upper body. She looks between the three boys with wide eyes, all of whom have jumped back a foot or two and are regarding her with some suspicion. "Oh, I am dense."
"And I'm Sirius."
Yes. Yes he is. Hermione is disgusted with herself for not realizing any sooner: James Potter and Sirius Black are sitting at her bedside, which means that the third boy—she looks at him, and he gives her a hesitant smile. "Remus?"
The smile fades immediately. "How d'you know my name?"
Everything about this makes no sense, or at least that is what Hermione feels inclined to believe. There are no documented cases of a time turner ever doing anything like this, so how could it be possible? She's dreaming, most likely. Perhaps in a coma—do wizards ever go into comas? She knows muggles can have coma-induced dreams that feel like real life, so maybe that's what's happened to her.
Of course, she also knows that she isn't in a coma. She looks Sirius, James and Remus up and down. They've got to be, what, in their sixth or seventh year?
Instead of answering Remus' question, she asks, "Why am I in the hospital wing?"
"We found you in the Great Hall," James replies immediately. "Or Moony did, that is, when he was on patrol." He looks at Remus apologetically.
"You looked a mess," Remus informs her. Hermione briefly considers the irony of Remus telling her this, and judging by the way James and Sirius snicker, they're thinking along the same lines. "You were bloody, scratched up, had a broken arm… That was three days ago."
Three days. Hermione had been in the wrong time for three days. She wonders how Ron had fared (how Ron will fare—strange concept) and wonders how long it took—will take—for people to notice that she was, is, will be missing.
"I need to get back," she mutters.
"What?"
She looks up at Remus, a determined look on her face. "I need to speak with Professor Dumbledore."
"Alright… Now? Are you sure you're up to it?"
"Of course I—" Hermione attempts to swing her legs over to the side of the bed, an action which sends another jolt of pain running through her. Immediately, she rethinks the situation and settles back. "Could he maybe come here?"
Remus suppresses a smile. "I think that could be arranged."
"Thank you." She settles back against the wall with a sigh. Remus, Sirius and James continue to stare at her, as though they're waiting for something to happen. "I don't think Dumbledore's going to fetch himself," she snaps.
The boys have some sort of unspoken argument, and finally Remus gets up with a grunt, muttering to himself as he makes his way to the door. "He'll be back in a flash," Sirius says with a grin.
"I think you have Moony a bit shaken." James' eyes twinkle from behind his glasses. "No mysterious girl has ever shown up in the Great Hall, woken up, and known his name before he introduced himself."
"Really? I assumed it was an everyday occurrence at Hogwarts," Hermione says dryly. As curious as she is to get to know Harry's father and his friends, she knows that it could be dangerous. She almost certainly should not have let slip that she knows Remus, because if this is any indication, they're not going to let the subject drop, no matter how clear she makes it that she won't be giving them any answers.
But they both laugh and seem to take the hint—for the moment, at least. "You're funny. I hope Dumbledore lets you stick around."
Harry is the first one to voice the question, though certainly not the first one to ponder it. "Has anyone seen Hermione?"
No. Not for hours.
They wonder if her body will be among those that they find scattered across the grounds or within the castle, and when it is not, they don't know whether or not they should be relieved.
"Y-you don't think she left?" Ron means ran away, and they all know it.
For the first time, Remus speaks up. "Not intentionally."
Dozens of pairs of eyes fall on him. "What do you mean?" Arthur asks.
"She's gone and if I'm right then I'm… I'm fairly certain she won't be coming back."
When Remus returns, Dumbledore is with him. Though Hermione has been attempting to prepare herself mentally, the sight of him living and breathing once again is a bit of a shock to her system (the entire experience is a bit of a shock to her system, of course). What she perhaps finds the most starling, however, is not the fact that he is still alive. Remus, James, and Sirius are just teenagers—the Remus and Sirius that she encountered had clearly aged. Dumbledore, on the other hand, looks exactly the same as he did on Hermione's first day at Hogwarts.
When he reaches her, the three boys fall back, watching from a respectable distance. Hoping to glean some information about this mysterious girl, no doubt, so that they can spread it around to the rest of the school.
Dumbledore smiles at her. A reserved smile. "It's good to see that you're awake, Miss… what may I call you?"
"Oh. Granger. Miss Granger." She glances at the three boys, and lowers her voice. "Could we talk alone for a moment, Professor?"
"Mr. Lupin, Mr. Potter—"
"Yeah, yeah, we get it. We're going." Sirius rolls his eyes and they turn away. Moving slowly, very slowly. Hoping to hear something else interesting.
But Dumbledore waits until they've left. "Now. Miss Granger, did you say it was?"
"Yes."
"I pride myself in being headmaster of one of the most highly-protected establishments in the wizarding world. Therefore, I am certain you understand my bewilderment when I say that I cannot comprehend how you came to be in the Great Hall of Hogwarts in the middle of the night."
Hermione chuckles darkly. "I don't think I quite understand it myself."
"That does create some problems."
"This might be a strange question, Professor, but what year is it?"
Dumbledore doesn't seem to find the question anywhere near as strange as she expects him to. "1977."
Twenty years. Hermione traveled twenty years into the past. She was not aware that such a malfunction was even possible. From all of her research, she had learned that time turners were specifically engineered to only send people a few days into the past at the most. Such a large jump should be impossible.
For the first time, she thinks of the time turner, and her hand flies to feel for it under her robes; it isn't there. She looks at Dumbledore helplessly.
"Are you looking for this?" He pulls the time turner out of the recesses of his own robes. "A curious object, I must say. Something that I've never encountered before. I had heard rumors about a secret project in the Department of Mysteries, developing a device that could travel through time, but as far as I knew they were nowhere near creating a fully-functioning… what do you call it?"
Hermione swallows. "It's a time turner."
"I see." He peers at her over his glasses. "Dare I direct our attention to the question hanging in the air, or shall we dance around the subject a while longer?"
"1998," she breathes.
Dumbledore sits down in the chair beside Hermione's bed and settles back, still examining her closely. "You expect me to believe that students—you are a student, yes?" Hermione nods. "That students are permitted to use devices that can send them twenty years into the past?"
She flushes. "I'm a bit of an exception. Some of my professors referred to me as the cleverest witch of my age." One of whom just left the room, Hermione wants to add. "And as far as I know, this should not have been possible. The time turner malfunctioned, or… or something. I don't know. There's no documented cases of this happening. But I was hoping that perhaps you might be able to help me figure out what went wrong so that I can get back."
"How do I know I can trust you?" he muses.
"I don't know."
"That's promising."
Hermione grimaces. "You trusted me when you knew me, Professor, so I doubt that I'll let you down now."
Dumbledore begins to smile, but his expression becomes grim almost immediately. "We meet in the future?"
"Well yes, of course, you're—"
He puts up a hand to silence her. "Miss Granger, this is very important. You cannot say a word to me about the future. If you are familiar with any of the students currently at school here at Hogwarts, you are not to speak with them. Or if you do, be cautious. If you are as exceptional as you claim to be, then I am sure I don't need to explain the potential havoc that could ensue, even unintentionally, from anything you might say or do."
"Yes, I do understand." She thinks of James, Sirius, and Remus, and their evident curiosity, and decides right then that it will be best to not speak with them at all.
"I will assist you in repairing your device—or, at least, I will attempt to assist you. I am perfectly willing to admit that even I don't know everything." He smiles slightly. "In the meantime, we must formulate a plausible reason for you to be here at Hogwarts. Students ask a lot of questions."
Hermione frowns. "Why can't I just become a student?"
"Today's date is February 17th. It's not particularly plausible to have a new student entering their seventh year of Hogwarts—"
"Oh. Yes, that makes sense. I wouldn't believe that either."
"I do, however, have an alternative that I might suggest."
"Yes?"
"Over Christmas break, we lost a librarian to an unfortunate incident while she was vacationing in Egypt. I have yet to find a replacement."
Her eyes light up. "You're asking me to work in the library?"
"A place you're fond of, I take it?"
"Fond of?" Hermione laughs. "I practically live there, according to Harry and—" She falters and notes that even a vague reference to her life doesn't seem to particularly please Dumbledore. "Yes. Yes I am. Yes, I'd love to. Please."