A Timeless Light is my fanfiction baby. i have SO much to do and tell with this story and in my mind it's a very grand plan. i hope to do the story justice so in the end readers can look back and see it the way i've envisioned it.

Disclaimer: I own none of these characters, I just like to torment them and see how they react.

The first part of this chapter is directly from Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, from the chapter The Worst Memories.
My story begins after the first page break.

February 28th, 1996

"He was at the office door when he saw it: a patch of shivering light dancing on the doorframe. He stopped, and stood looking at it, reminded of something... then he remembered; it was a little like the lights he had seen in his dream last night, the lights in the second room he had walked through on his journey through the Department of Mysteries.

He turned around. The light was coming from the Pensieve sitting on Snape's desk. The silver-white contents were ebbing and swirling within. Snape's thoughts... things he did not want Harry to see if he broke through Snape's defenses accidentally...

Harry gazed at the Pensieve, curiosity welling inside him... what was it that Snape was so keen to hide from Harry?

The silvery lights shivered on the wall... Harry took two steps towards the desk, thinking hard. Could it possibly be information about the Department of Mysteries that Snape was determined to keep from him?

Harry looked over his shoulder, his heart now pumping harder and faster than ever. How long would it take Snape to release Montague from the toilet? Would he come straight back to his office afterwards, or accompany Montague to the hospital wing? Surely the latter... Montague was Captain of the Slytherin Quidditch team, Snape would want to make sure he was all right.

Harry walked the remaining few feet to the Pensieve and stood over it, gazing into its depths. He hesitated, listening, then pulled out his wand again. The office and the corridor beyond were completely silent. He gave the contents of the Pensieve a small prod with the end of his wand.

The silvery stuff within began to swirl very fast. Harry leaned forwards over it and saw that it had become transparent. He was, once again, looking down into a room as though through a circular window in the ceiling... in fact, unless he was much mistaken, he was looking down into the Great Hall.

His breath was actually fogging the surface of Snape's thoughts... his brain seemed to be in limbo... it would be insane to do the thing he was so strongly tempted to do... he was trembling... Snape could be back at any moment... but Harry thought of Cho's anger, of Malfoy's jeering face, and a reckless daring seized him.

He took a great gulp of breath, and plunged his face into the surface of Snape's thoughts. At once, the floor of the office lurched, tipping Harry head-first into the Pensieve...

He was falling through cold blackness, spinning furiously as he went, and then..."

"Get out, get out, I don't want to see you in this office ever again!"

Harry bolted for the door as fast as he could and just as he reached it, a jar of dead cockroaches exploded against the stone wall over his head. He tossed the door open and sprinted away through the corridors, only stopping when he had put three floors between him and the furious potion's master.

He was in shock. He couldn't believe the things he had just witnessed. It had started off badly enough, terribly to be honest, with James, Sirius, Remus and Peter tormenting Severus. Suspending him upside down, making fun of him for his underwear, teasing him mercilessly. And then Lily tried to stop them, shouting angrily at James, her dislike for him written plainly on her face and her disgust obvious in her voice. In the next instant, and in payment of her defense of him, Severus angrily calling her a mudblood. It ended with her cool dismissal of him.

But then the worst part, the thing that he wished he could unsee- that he could never know about his father. The thing that his potion's master had seemed incredibly shocked that he had accidentally allowed Harry to witness, something that he had clearly never intended on telling Harry about, even though he got malicious pleasure from telling him how arrogant and bullying James had been. Obviously, he had no plans for showing him just how sadistic James had truly been.

Harry wished he had never touched that Pensieve.

He broke into a desperate run again, flying along the corridors, knowing only that he desperately needed to escape these walls that held so many secrets, so many lies. Before he knew it he was outside, sprinting across the grounds and past Hagrid's hut, deep into the cover of the twisting trees and heavy air. The Forbidden Forest, to the same little clearing not very far from Hagrid's, by the tiny trickling stream and rotted, fallen oaks that he had seen in Snape's memories.

He finally stopped here, gasping for breath, doubled over as his sides protested in agony. Here, where Snape had followed his father from the castle when he had seen him walking through the doors alone as night fell. He had not had the Invisibility Cloak, or the Marauder's Map, just his wand in one hand, broom in the other, and a calm, cold arrogance that he would not be tempered. Snape had obviously made the decision to follow him while hoping to catch him alone and unawares and repay him for the humiliating incident from earlier that day. He crept along quietly as James made his way to the Quidditch pitch, and Harry followed along through the memory, not knowing what was coming.

He watched beside Snape as James arrived at the Quidditch pitch and called out to a Ravenclaw boy as he was apparently leaving late night practice with the Ravenclaw team. His name was Jeremy, and he approached James without a second thought, waving his teammates on ahead. Just as Jeremy began to turn to James, his mouth open to perhaps ask what it was the other boy wanted, James lifted his wand level with Jeremy's chest.

"Imperio." Jeremy's face went slack, his eyes slid out of focus, and the question died on his lips. Snape and Harry froze in shock, just feet away as Snape crouched by a broom shed in the shadows.

"Walk next to me, Jeremy; around the other side of the field, towards the forest. We wouldn't want your friends to see us, would we?" James said coldly, his blue eyes flashing in the dark behind his glasses. Jeremy obeyed without a word and James followed close beside him, wand hidden between their bodies. Snape scrabbled to his feet after the pair was a ways ahead and hurried after them, careful to duck into the shadows around him to avoid being seen. Harry followed on numb feet, hardly believing what he was seeing.

James marched the boy into the Forbidden Forest, not going so far that he wouldn't be able to find his way back out, but deeply enough that it occurred to Harry how any noise that took place here would be for the ears of the forest only. He felt a chill crawl up his spine as James finally halted in the distance and Snape shuffled forward very slowly, very quietly, to observe.

"Jeremy, look at me, please," James said almost cordially, if not for the barely concealed malice in his words. The dazed boy did as instructed.

"Jeremy, today I saw you with Evans, after dinner and that unfortunate fiasco with Snivellus. I followed you out of the Great Hall, saw you ask her to speak with you privately in one of the classrooms. And then I heard you tell her that you hoped she'd go on another date with you to Hogsmeade this next weekend, and what a wonderful time you had last trip. That was the trip that I wasn't there, was it not? I had detention and you used that opportunity to get close to her, mess with what's mine. I thought I told you clearly once before that I was interested in Evans, and for you to back off. But you didn't Jeremy, you didn't and now I'm angry."

As James spoke, his voice began to lose its calm, collected quality and develop a disturbing pitch. His words became uneven, the hand pointing his wand at the boy began to shake slightly, and his face seemed to twist terribly in the moonlight that filtered down through the dense treetops. Harry realized that his hands were shaking too, and he glanced at the young Snape and saw the same burgeoning horror on his face that he himself was feeling. Back in the clearing, Jeremy mumbled an ascent to James that he had tried to get close to Lily, and as Harry's attention turned back to this memory of his father, James Potter, a dam seemed to break within the boy.

"Crucio!" He screamed, his voice rippling with crazed anger. Jeremy fell to the forest floor screaming and writhing as James watched on with a terribly satisfied smile. On and on it seemed to go, and Harry wasn't sure how much more of this he could stand to watch, when James finally lifted his wand. Jeremy collapsed onto his stomach, heaving and twitching.

"Jeremy, I want you to apologize to me for trying to take what is mine," James informed him pleasantly.

"I- I... I'm sorry, Potter. I'm sorry, I shouldn't have messed with her," the boy choked out, gasping for breath as he did so.

"And now tell me that you'll never do so again. Because if you do, I will kill you. Slowly, delicately... I will torture you just until you think you can't take more, then I will heal you and do it all over again. I will make you beg for mercy, only to make you suffer for begging such a thing." James seemed to be slipping again, losing his tenacious hold on control.

"I won't! I won't... touch her again, I won't talk to her again, just don't do it again, I swear, I promise," Jeremy was struggling to his hands and knees now, trying to stand. He didn't see James lift his wand again, shadows dancing sinisterly on his face.

"No, Jeremy, you definitely won't. Because when the night is over, you're not going to be able to mess with anyone's girl again for a very long time. And the best part? You're not even going to remember why."

Jeremy's head snapped up, eyes widening in fear as he saw James' wand trained on him again.

"No, please-!"

"Crucio!"

June 18th, 1996

The room was now dark; the only source of light came from the flickering inside the broken Time cabinet. Each time the cabinet tipped over & smashed against the stone floor, dozens of winking lights faded into the darkness. Then the cabinet immediately righted itself, the lights twinkled, and everything repeated. The Time Turners were irreversibly damaged as far as Harry could tell

He stood for a few moments longer than his friends, falling behind as Neville rushed out of the room with an injured Hermione in his arms. The flickering lights flashed in the reflection of his glasses, but his expression never changed as the cabinet shattered on repeat; he appeared dazed, unaware of the cacophony.

"Harry! Harry, come on, we've got to go now!" Neville's voice echoed into the room as if from far away through the partially opened door. Harry shook himself back to reality and turned away from the Time cabinet. He rushed to the door, realizing he'd wasted precious time here. He almost didn't notice the tiny light shining to his left, in the far corner of the room; not until his hand landed on the doorknob and he slowed his pace. He turned slowly, as if in a trance, hardly daring to breathe.

There it was, just feet away from him. Small and unobtrusive, barely a speck of dim light that threatened to be swallowed by the surrounding darkness. Harry let go of the door handle almost without thinking and slowly walked to it. Reaching out hesitantly, reverently, he picked up the lone Time Turner, the only one left. Behind him the cabinet continued to shatter and reform, and in his hands he held this one tiny piece of forever- his salvation.

May 2nd, 1998

Reality seemed to be fading in and out around Hermione as the battle raged around her. On the floor in the Great Hall, bloody, bruised, beaten... surrounded by the carnage and chaos that seemed to follow Harry and Voldemort wherever they went. She turned her head to the side, fighting back the sharp pain that protested every movement. Tears filled her eyes as she did so; not at the pain, but as she took in her immediate surroundings once again. She wish she hadn't looked, hadn't remembered.

Ron lay just feet away from her, close enough that she could perhaps touch him if she reached out. But he wouldn't feel it, would never feel it again. His head was turned to her, eyes open but unseeing; his neck was bent at an unnatural angle, and his body lay broken and motionless. She had seen him fall just moments before Bellatrix hit her with a powerful curse that left her bleeding out slowly, lethargic and slipping away quietly. Ron was dead, and she would soon follow. Harry had been dueling Voldemort last she had seen him, but he had been steadily losing ground, no match for the Dark Lord and the Elder wand that now answered to him after the murder of Draco Malfoy just weeks before at Malfoy Manor

It was all over.

She heard a sharp cry of pain not far from where was lying, a voice she knew as well as her own. Another harsh cry, and then cackling laughter. Harry's body thudded to the ground beside her and his head landed on her stomach. She dared not open her eyes again to see him, terrified to see him, her hero, her best friend, as lifeless as Ron on her other side. She prayed for death to find her quickly.

"Hermione, can you hear me? Are you okay?" Harry's voice was rough and cracked with pain, but near her ear. She felt him adjust himself slightly against her, his hand moving between them as he felt for something against his chest. She turned her head slowly, away from Ron to face Harry. She opened her eyes slightly to regard him dazedly. Harry's head was lying across her stomach, with his chest pressed against her side. He had one hand in his robes and was starting intently at her, something fierce burning in his gaze. Hermione fought to focus.

"Hermione, you have to do something for me, okay? Something that I can't do myself, I have to stay here. But there's something I'm going to give you, that if you use it the right way then maybe I might can defeat him, in a different way. We don't have much time- will you do this for me?" Harry was rushing, almost tripping over his words. Behind him Hermione could see Voldemort and some of his followers laughing and jeering at them, though not paying much attention anymore. Why should they? Victory was obviously theirs. A burning rage shot through Hermione as she saw their gleeful faces, heard their celebratory shouting. A hatred unlike she'd ever experienced welled within her. Anything, anything to change this. Nothing could more terrible than this moment.

"Tell me, Harry. Quickly, we have to try," she whispered to him. Her eyes darted to the hand hidden by his robes as he pulled it out. His fist was wrapped tightly around something small, something with a familiar, long, golden chain...

"Harry, how do you have this?! The entire cabinet was destroyed-"

"It's not important, Hermione. Right now what matters is that I have one and that I need you to take it and go back, very, very far back. Change all of this." Harry interrupted her, staring at her with that fierce look in his eyes again. He pressed the Time Turner into her hand and tossed the long golden chain up around her head, where it immediately tangled with her wild curls.

"All of this? How far back are you thinking, Harry? I don't know if it's even possible for the Time Turner to spin back that many times!" Hermione whispered frantically to him, clutching the precious object closely to herself.

"It is possible, I've tested it myself the last few months with a spell that speeds up the speed of the turns. I'll cast the spell, you just have to hold on- it's not going to feel good." Harry shifted slightly against her and pulled his wand out from underneath him. He angled it up slightly towards the Time Turner clasped in her hands.

"I'm going to send you back to when my parents were still in school, Hermione. I want you to do your best to change all of this, create a totally different future, one where we stand a better chance of defeating Voldemort. I want you to go to Dumbledore, tell him about the Horcruxes, and start finding them years sooner. I want you to know my parents, I want you to... help them, if you can." Harry broke off here and averted his gaze, and Hermione almost asked why but he didn't give her the chance. His gaze snapped back to her and it seemed he'd reached a firm decision with himself.

"Are you ready?" Harry asked. And that's when something terrible finally occurred to her.

"If I do this... what happens to you here, Harry?" She asked softly, though she already knew the answer, and that Harry knew it, too. His fierce gaze seemed to gentle slightly, a ghost of a smile crossing his face.

"I beat him, of course."

Tears welled up in Hermione's eyes as she stared at her best friend for what might be the last time. She knew she might not survive the past, might not make her way back to a new future. She might lose him forever here on this cold stone floor surrounded by the dead bodies of their fallen friends.

"I love you, Harry," she simply said.

"I'll see you soon," he replied with a faint smile, a smile that reminded her briefly of better days. She let her hands fall open around the Time Turner for him to cast his spell.

"Intoarce repede." Immediately the tiny hourglass began to spin counterclockwise, flashing so fast that the tiny sphere began to glow faintly from within. Hermione felt time began to slowly sift around her, differently than she'd ever felt it before. This time it was like a heavy blanket had been draped over her; like how she'd fall asleep at night so suddenly, and yet so slowly. She watched Harry through glazed eyes as the feeling grew heavier, more intense. She barely registered the sudden commotion behind Harry, only faintly acknowledged Voldemort's furious screams as he bore down on them, wand outstretched. The world fell away from under her as curse after curse echoed through the momentary rip in time that was all she left behind her on the cold floor of the Great Hall.

Harry's body thudded to the ground as Hermione disappeared from beneath him, though he no longer felt the dull pains that shot through him. He let himself fall to his back, staring up at the starry night sky above Hogwarts castle. He felt rather than saw Voldemort approaching him. A crazed scream, a flash of bright green light... and the Boy-Who-Lived smiled serenely to himself one last time.