[AN: This is utter crack. It's what happens when you get writer's block and then decide to write the 'epilogue' to your AU as a married!Tomione time-travel fix-it fic, when you're only halfway through the third book of seven. It's been done for months, and I just found out that Tomione Day is a thing, so I figured I'd publish it. You do NOT need to have read Mary Potter to enjoy this story, though it does take place in a (rather unlikely) possible future of that universe.]

Tom and Hermione's Excellent Vacation

AKA: The story of how AU Future Hermione and Tom Riddle kidnap… I mean adopt Canon Harry.

Part I

Sometime in the summer of 2010

The Trouble with Family Reunions

Mary Potter Universe

Hermione really should have known better.

Mary had only been back from her world tour of foreign magical exploration and adventuring for five years, but that should have been long enough for a witch who was often praised for her brilliance to have picked up on the fact that Mary's family gatherings always ended poorly. (Despite the fact that Mary was her adopted sister, and Sirius her former Magical Guardian, Hermione really couldn't bring herself to consider most of the Blacks and their assorted hangers-on her family.)

It was extremely difficult – far moreso than Hermione thought it ought to have been – to get everyone together in the first place. They could never meet on the Major Sabbats, because Sirius, Tonks, and Dan didn't celebrate them, nor on muggle holidays, because Tom and Draco promised to whine about progressives the whole time; rarely while Hogwarts was in session, because it was too difficult for Tom and Remus to get away, and only in the evenings when the Wizengamot was in session, because Hermione, Draco, and Sirius were all busy on those days; Snape, Dan, and Mary were all self-employed, and so could normally arrange for days off whenever they pleased, but Andromeda, Tonks, and Narcissa all had unpredictable social or employment obligations.

Still, once a time and place were decided upon (and the place couldn't be too posh, nor too lowbrow, had to be open to muggles, had to be child-friendly, and Snape insisted on 'neutral territory' which meant all the Black properties were out…), things generally went alright for a couple of hours. Everyone caught up with each-other, made polite noises about the children (asked Tom and Hermione when they were planning on having children), ate far too much well-catered food (or home-cooked, if Dan and Mary had the time), and had a few glasses of wine or mead or apple-juice, if they were four or pregnant. But after a certain amount of time – five and a half hours, with a standard error of fifteen minutes– the situation began to deteriorate.

Tom claimed not to have cursed the concept of family reunions, but he might have been lying.

There was a striking similarity between the effects of the DADA Curse and the results of every Black (Potter, Granger, Riddle, Tonks, Lupin, Snape) Family Reunion: widely varied mayhem and disagreements, on a specific timeline, resulting in what appeared to be a random series of unfortunate events, ranging from Sirius challenging Tom to a pick-up contest at a magical pub in Dublin to Snape and Narcissa getting into a massive row over the education of Mary and Draco's unborn child. Tonks always seemed to be fighting with Remus about something, or else with her mother about her latest separation from her husband and the effect Andromeda was certain their on-again, off-again relationship must have on their son's development. Even the children often caused mayhem: on one particularly memorable occasion, Teddy completely changed his appearance and wandered away at a muggle resort hotel, and Lyra, Mary's eldest child, was especially prone to large, destructive bursts of accidental magic, which had gotten them all the wrong sort of attention at more than one muggle venue.

But nothing ever went so spectacularly wrong as when Bellatrix actually deigned to show up.

Mary always sent an invitation to Bellatrix, because Bellatrix was, undeniably, a Black, and therefore part of the family, even if she hardly ever acted like it. Since the Battle of Hogwarts, in 1998, Hermione had only seen Bellatrix three times, and each one was an unmitigated disaster. The main problem was that Bellatrix hated Tom. Even Tom admitted she had good reason: his alter-ego had turned her into a mind-slave from the age of five, apprenticed her at age eight, had her take the Dark Mark at fifteen, then let her spend the next fifteen years or so doing all the grunt work of running the Death Eaters before getting himself mostly-killed and letting her rot in Azkaban for more than a decade.

Hermione, however, thought that Bellatrix should take into consideration the fact that her Tom – Tom who had spent six and a half years in a diary, who had grown up a bit and decided to take a less destructive, more effective road to power – was not the same man who had casually planted compulsions in the brain of a likely overactive, exceedingly irritating five-year-old. (Hermione assumed that the woman's personality hadn't changed all that much: she was still ridiculously hyper and irritating, and had the attention-span of a gnat.) Tom's openly admitting that he probably would have done resulted in Tonks, Remus, and Andromeda whisking the young Teddy away too quickly for Hermione to even say goodbye. It was nearly a year before they dared attend another function with him, and that was only after they made Tom swear an unbreakable vow not to mess with the little metamorph's mind. That was the first encounter with Bellatrix.

The second time, the Black Mage insinuated that Hermione had better guard against Tom leaving her for a younger woman (Bellatrix had been only sixteen, after all, when the forty-year-old Voldemort had taken up with her, and after his second resurrection, Hermione was somewhere around thirty years younger than her own version of the man). When that failed to get a rise out of either of them, Bellatrix had picked a fight with Snape, who always treated her with the only-barely-disguised hostility otherwise reserved for Sirius, which resulted in a duel. Hermione, as Snape's former apprentice, had been honor-bound to fight the madwoman when he was incapacitated, and when she was injured as well, Tom gave up his façade of indifference to challenge her himself. This was, so far as Hermione was concerned, perfectly acceptable behavior, especially coming from her overly-possessive husband. What was not acceptable was the fact that after he fought Bellatrix to a stand-still, he continued to torture her for a good ten minutes, all the while fending off everyone else's attempts to get him to stop. (Thankfully, Tonks had taken Teddy home as soon as Bellatrix showed up, or else Hermione doubted she would ever have seen the kid again.)

The third time Bellatrix had shown up (earlier that day, or, well, the gods only knew when, really), she had thrown something shiny at Hermione – something Hermione could now identify as a small triangular pyramid made of polished obsidian and inlaid with hundreds of tiny, golden runes. It had cut straight through the shield she conjured to block its flight, and as soon as it touched her, wrenched her out of the universe with a sensation which was disconcertingly similar to a portkey crossed with a time-turner. Closer examination of the runes only confirmed that impression.

Still lying on the ground, to which she had fallen (due partially to the unfortunate fact that she had been seated when she was abducted, but more to the fact that she had been forcibly repelled from an anti-portkey ward), Hermione decided that was it. She was never going to another Black Family Function.

…

"Umm… Bella," Mary said hesitantly, looking at the chair her adopted sister had so-recently occupied as she struggled with the rambunctious two-year-old on her hip. "Where did Hermione go?"

Bellatrix shrugged. "Alternate Universe, I expect. I built a randomization sequence into the portkey array, though, so I'm not sure which one. Have you all ordered yet?"

Every person over the age of seven turned to stare at the Black witch, their expressions ranging from confusion to rage to fear.

"Bellatrix," Tom said, in a dangerously pleasant tone, "if you don't tell me precisely what you have done to my wife in the next thirty seconds, I will extract the information from you by the most painful means I can devise."

Bella gave him a mad grin. "Oh, goodie! I love this game!"

}{-}{-}{-}{-}{

4 November, 1991

Inconvenient Faffing About

Harry Potter Universe

In a field somewhere in Britain, at an as-yet-unknown time, Hermione decided that as a responsible member of the Magical British community, she truly ought to at least look about and see whether any muggles had spotted her sudden and inexplicable appearance.

The answer, she decided, was probably no. After all, those awful white peacocks could belong to no one but the Malfoys, and they were most definitely the sort to put up muggle-repelling wards.

Okay, then, she thought, that's one bit sorted. A quick tempus charm revealed the next bit: the date was the fourth of November, 1991.

Lacking a return… enchanted time-portkey thing, interdimensional time travel was a ritual trick best attempted on Yule, which meant she had quite a lot of time to kill before she could attempt to make her way back home. Bug all, she grumped silently.

She struggled to her feet with a groan, wishing fervently that she had spent less time in the past ten years on magical theory and law, and more on perfecting the art of casting healing spells on oneself, and wracking her brain in an effort to figure out why this date ought to have been significant.

Ah, she thought, her mind alighting on a bit of trivia. That was probably it.

She cast a facsimile of the Dark Mark at her left arm, wincing at the burn of it – no mere illusion, but enough magic to stand up to the examination of an actual Death Eater – and began trekking toward the manor-house, barely visible through the trees.

…

Narcissa answered the door herself. Hermione supposed she must have been terribly bored, or perhaps lonely, now that Draco was off to school. She nearly giggled to see the stuck-up pureblood ice-queen Lady Malfoy had been nearly five years before they first met. For one thing, they looked to be nearly the same age now. And for another, they had reached a level of familiarity over the years that let Hermione clearly read her curiosity behind her indifferent mask.

Instead she properly tendered her greetings and requested an audience with the woman's husband.

"It's regarding the Dark Lord's business," she added, when Narcissa hesitated, and was reluctantly shown into a parlor.

…

Lucius Malfoy was not best pleased when his assigned task was interrupted by a house elf summoning him to the Small Receiving Room. He had only just started informing the Dark Lord's Horcrux – and who even made horcruxes, anyway? – about the circumstances which led him to write in it, a job which he preferred to complete as quickly as possible. He wouldn't be bothering at all, save for the fact that if it turned out the Dark Lord, whom Lucius was certain was not truly gone, managed to find some other way of returning to power and discovered that he failed to follow orders, Lucius would be a dead man walking.

But Narcissa had used the code-word that meant urgent-for-the-future-of-the-family, can't-wait, no-nonsense business, so make his way to the Small Receiving Room he did.

There was a witch waiting for him. If he had to guess, he would have put her in her early thirties. He took in her short, wildly curly brown hair and lack of extensive makeup, well-tailored but modestly-expensive robes, and somewhat harried, exasperated expression with a cool glance. A clerk of some sort, perhaps, or a minor Ministry official, doubtless on an errand for someone more important, given the urgency of Narcissa's summons.

"Welcome to Malfoy Manor," he greeted her, bowing correctly. "I don't believe we have been introduced. I am Lucius, Lord of the Noble and Ancient House of Malfoy."

The witch rose from the chaise lounge upon which she had perched and curtsied in turn, extending her left hand prettily. At least, he thought, whomever had sent her had chosen a well-trained messenger-bird. "Well met, Lord Malfoy. I am Hermione of the Minor House of Riddle."

Lucius did not recall the House of Riddle, but he did not make a point of memorizing the name of every minor pureblood family. Her observation of the proprieties spoke well enough for her breeding, anyway. As such it would unfortunately not be polite to simply demand she state her business and be done with it. "Well met. May I offer you refreshment, Ms. Riddle?"

"Tea would be lovely, Lord Malfoy."

Tea was, in fact, not lovely, but rather stilted and stiff. Halfway through his first cup, at the absolute earliest propriety allowed, he cracked. "Might I enquire as to what business has brought you to my door, Ms. Riddle?"

The witch stilled, then settled her teacup in its saucer before meeting his eyes solidly. "It has come to my attention, Lord Malfoy, that you are in possession of a certain diary…"

…

Fifteen minutes later, Hermione disapparated from Malfoy Manor, a slim, leatherbound book in her pocket and a grim smile on her face, thinking that if Lucius had been one of the Dark Lord's best Death Eaters, it was no wonder he had been so easily defeated. The bloody idiot hadn't even bothered to check whether she was Marked before handing over the Horcrux. Anyone could have walked right in claiming to be an agent of the Dark Lord. Shoddy work, that's what that was. She made a mental note to mock Voldemort about his choice of servants before executing him.

There was, of course, no question that she would execute him. There were only three people in this time whose lives she cared to change: one was trapped in a book; one was unfairly locked in Azkaban; and one was a target of a mad, undead Dark Lord. As long as she was faffing about in the past (and now an alternate universe, if it hadn't been before), she might as well have something to do to pass the time.

…

The first thing Hermione did on apparating away from the Malfoys was… acquire a not-insubstantial cheque from a very rude London executive sort with the help of a minor compulsion and a Confundus Charm. She did not, generally speaking, condone thievery, especially stealing from muggles with magic. It was something she had reprimanded Tom for on more than one occasion. But needs must, and all that. Plus he was very rude.

After quick stop at the nearest Lloyds and another at Gringotts, Mr. Mason's pounds found themselves supplementing the meagre collection of galleons Hermione had seen fit to bring with her to Mary's ill-fated dinner party. This was a necessary step because her second act was to take a room at a small Knockturn Alley inn called, suitably enough, the Nocturne Inn. It was owned by an old squib and catered mostly to the 'sapient dark creatures' crowd – werewolves, vampires, hags, and so on. It was the sort of place where everyone minded their own business so long as they paid up-front, which she did.

She had intended for her third step to be acquiring a new wardrobe and other daily essentials, with an eye toward finding a way to get into Hogwarts after Quirrellmort, without tipping off Dumbledore or anyone else that she was from The Future(-ish), but this plan was derailed by a chance glimpse at the Daily Prophet as she headed toward Peaseblossom and Puck's. The Headline? Boy-Who-Lived Saves Muggleborn from Troll.

}{-}{-}{-}{-}{

5 November, 1991

"I'm your wife. From the future. And an alternate universe."

Hello, Tom. My name is Hermione Granger. Today's date is 5 November 1991.

Hello, Hermione. May I ask what happened to Lucius? Did he tell you how this diary works?

Lucius is fine. I mean, he's a bloody idiot – I have to say, I find your alter-ego's taste in minions leaves something to be desired. He just handed over this horcrux without even checking to see whether I had a Dark Mark. I've left him safely at his little manor house to do… whatever rich idiots do all day. Frankly I've no idea. And no, there is nothing he could possibly have told me about this diary that I didn't already know.

Who are you?

Hmmm… funny story, that. I'm your wife.

What?

I haven't got a wife!

From the future.

…?

And an alternate universe.

?

You, or rather, your counterpart in my home-universe, escaped this journal when I was thirteen (1993) through what I gather was a rather ad hoc re-embodiment ritual, and spent several years at Miskatonic before returning to become the Hogwarts DADA instructor (finally) in 1997. You stripped the mind of your alter-ego at the end of that year and we (you, me, your granddaughter, and a couple friends of ours) re-incarnated you properly a few months later.

Wait. WHAT?

Hmmm… the 'original' Tom Riddle went on to make four additional horcruxes as well as to travel extensively in Europe and Asia, pursuing numerous alternative methods of obtaining immortality and knowledge before returning to Magical Britain. After 1955, he created a cult of personality under the name 'Lord Voldemort.' So far as we have gathered, he spent most of his time a) placating his followers by launching deliberately-overly-complex attacks on the wizarding and muggle governments b) harassing Albus Dumbledore c) torturing and killing muggles and muggleborns indiscriminately and d) experimenting with Dark Arts, ritual magic, alternative uses of runes, enchanting, time travel… basically anything that caught your fancy, apparently.

Um…

What went wrong? In 1980, a prophecy was made that 'one who has the power to vanquish the Dark Lord approaches, born(e) as the seventh month dies.' Voldemort's spy only overheard that much, and due to a particularly obtuse and literal interpretation on Dumbledore's part and his subsequent actions, V. identified Mary Potter as the most likely candidate to be the prophesied 'one.' The Potters were in hiding, but were discovered in 1981, and V. rushed to destroy their infant daughter, disregarding the fact that it was Samhain eve. Bit of advice: don't try to sell your soul for knowledge if it's already damaged – some demons will cheerfully take your sanity instead.

Now, it is relevant to note here that in 1959, in pursuit of eternal youth and a dramatically increased healing factor, V. sacrificed his ability to have children to the Destructive Power in the course of a ritual which, ironically, resulted in the conception of a child. V. left the child's mother to die in a fire, but she managed to escape and found her way to a muggle hospital. The child, a girl called Lily, was placed with muggle relatives for her safety as an infant, attended Hogwarts as a muggleborn, joined the struggle against V., and eventually married pureblood James Potter. It was their daughter, his own granddaughter, whom V. tried to kill in 1981.

Lily Potter, by all accounts, took after her father, or what he might have been, given a happier and more supportive upbringing. In addition to sacrificing herself to protect her infant daughter, she also wrote an invocation ward which called upon Adrestia to visit justice upon anyone who dared attempt violence against her child. V's Killing Curse struck the child, carrying off Lily's soul before the protection ritual had time to settle, and the Justice ward utterly destroyed V's body in retaliation. V's own soul and life-spark, unable to move on due to the horcruxes, was pulled into Lily's soul-protection ritual. He managed to tear himself free, damaging his life-spark in the process, and fled.

Presumably it was the same in this universe, but with Harry Potter instead of Mary Potter.

In 1991, V's shade – the remains of his soul and life spark – managed to possess the Hogwarts DADA instructor and infiltrate the castle in an effort to obtain the Philosopher's Stone. In 1992, Lucius Malfoy slipped (the counterpart of) this diary to a first-year Gryffindor, who opened the Chamber of Secrets and did (briefly) manage to have Dumbledore expelled from the school. He's the Headmaster now. Sorry, I know you hate him. As I've said, in 1993 your counterpart managed to acquire a body, and apparently decided that V. was a complete idiot, but potentially too dangerous to approach directly at that time, given the fact that he did have forty-odd years' experience on you. In 1995, V. built a new body – via life alchemy, I think – and recalled his Death Eaters. He spent most of the 1995-1996 school year attempting to access the full wording of the prophecy to see where he had gone wrong. I tricked him in 1996 into agreeing to exchange said prophecy for a truce: a year and a day. He spent the next year recruiting, then instigated a series of escalating attacks beginning in the summer of 1997. My friends and I, meanwhile, destroyed the other horcruxes. He attacked Hogwarts in 1998, where he was defeated by your counterpart, and struck down from behind by a Killing Curse.

This all sounds… entirely mad, you do realize?

Oh, yes. And it was. Believe me, I lived it. Anyway, your counterpart and I had begun a clandestine affair in 1997. I was his student, but also 19-ish due to a certain degree of time-travelling in my third year. Over the course of that year, it became clear that the body he created in 1993 was deteriorating much more quickly than anticipated. After the battle in 1998, with the knowledge he had stolen from your alter-ego, we created a new, more stable body for him. He took up the DADA position and Head of Slytherin House with a new name and an older face, and had worked his way up to Deputy Headmaster by 2010. I went into law, and acted as Mary's Wizengamot Proxy while she travelled the world. Your counterpart joined mine and Draco Malfoy's political alliance in 1998. We married in 2008 because he is a possessive, persistent bastard, and I didn't have a good reason to say no. I kept my maiden name, though. This is the 21st Century, after all. Um. Will be.

I… I think I need some time to process all that. I'm… it's just so…

I find it helps if you think of V. as your evil(er) twin. Also, drop the hesitant child façade – it doesn't suit.

Eviler? You wound me.

I try.

I think I might like you.

I should hope so.

}{-}{-}{-}{-}{

16 November, 1991

"On a quest."

Hermione had been in 1991 in what she was privately thinking of as 'Harry's Universe' for almost two weeks, chatting with Tom in the Diary (who was strangely like and not-like her own Tom, and seemed very young), collecting horcruxes (the Gaunt ring and Slytherin's locket had been absurdly easy to access, between her familiarity with Tom's warding preferences and a false Dark Mark – at least Walburga Black had checked before she handed over the necklace) and trying to suss out all the little differences between this world and her own.

For the most part, they seemed… similar.

At first, seeing that headline in Diagon Alley, she had thought that perhaps Neville had been the Boy Who Lived from the start, here, as well as the "Prophesied Savior" instead of Mary being the Girl Who Lived. As it turned out, however, the Boy was Harry Potter, born to James and Lily Potter on 31 July, 1980. He, like Mary, had survived a killing curse at the age of one (and three months), then disappeared, likely with the dubious "help" of Headmaster Dumbledore, since he had been produced to attend his first year at Hogwarts.

Harry Potter was a Gryffindor, according to the papers, like his parents, as was the muggleborn girl he had allegedly saved from a troll: one Hermione Granger. Hermione recalled having teetered on the brink of Ravenclaw and Gryffindor for several minutes under the Hat, so perhaps her placement there was not such a surprise, but she could not imagine Mary placed anywhere but Slytherin. Harry, she thought, must be quite different, to be the sort of boy who goes running after trolls.

Speaking of which, she distinctly recalled that, in her world, the troll had not gotten anywhere near students. The Slytherins had evacuated outside, and the other houses, both Ravenclaw and Gryffindor included, had returned safely to their dorms, using the smallest, most inaccessible corridors their prefects knew. She herself had not seen a troll until she and Lili had chased Quirrell and Snape into the third-floor Obstacle Course at the end of the year.

The Hogwarts Rolls had been posted in one of the September Prophets, however, and all the other students seemed to be the same sexes she remembered, and sorted into the same houses. Sirius Black was still in Azkaban, and Remus Lupin had disappeared from wizarding society ten years before. Cornelius Fudge was the Minister of Magic, and John Major was the PM, all as it should be, or at least as she had expected.

Dan and Emma Granger still owned a successful orthodontics and oral surgery clinic in Maidstone; Emma was still alive and able to be visited, though after a week of second-guessing herself, Hermione had firmly decided against doing so: She had come to terms with her mother's death more than a decade prior, and had no desire to dredge up the past. Besides, what was she supposed to do? Tell them that she was their adult daughter from an alternate future, lost in the time-stream? They had only known of magic for a few months. Dan would think it a great story – like something out of Dr. Who – but Emma would immediately begin to question everything that had happened in the past twenty years, and Hermione could see it becoming far too complicated all too quickly. Not to mention that she would either want to stay forever, when she definitely had a life to return to in 2010 in her own universe, or they would have nothing in common, which might be worse. And seeing them without talking to them openly would be far worse than not seeing them at all. All in all, it would be better to just stay away.

To that end, twelve days after arriving in 1991, she had decided that it was time to make a visit to Hogwarts, in an effort to discover exactly why only those three details – Mary's sex and sorting; Young Hermione's sorting; and the fact that the two of them had been threatened by a troll – appeared to be different between Hermione's universe and this one.

Completely aside from the matter of her own curiosity, she needed to verify that Sirius Black was innocent in this world before she let him out of Azkaban, and check that Quirrell, who was indeed the DADA professor this year, had been possessed by Voldemort. This necessitated breaking into the castle to capture Ron Weasley's pet rat and cast a few diagnostic charms at the be-turbaned Professor. Plus she ought to retrieve the Diadem of Ravenclaw from the Room of Requirement.

Hermione could not help but feel a bit nostalgic for her own school days. There was something about sneaking around Hogwarts performing absurd tasks in the dead of night in order to save the day that made her feel like a kid again.

On a quest.

}{-}{-}{-}{-}{

30 November, 1991

Differences

Hogwarts was not especially difficult to break into. Sirius had managed to do it twice, while half out of his mind, with dementors at the perimeter and no wand to hand. For a sane, experienced witch who had arguably spent as many hours sneaking around and getting into trouble as she had studying at school (she blamed the Slytherins… and the Weasleys… and Tom… okay, maybe she wasn't entirely blameless), it was almost too easy. Even gaining entry to Gryffindor Tower was pathetically simple. All she had to do was maintain a combination of Translucency and Disillusionment Charms (the combined effect of which was closer to invisibility than anything else short of Mary's cloak) while a student gave the password to the portrait, then clamber through the doorway behind them.

This was the third time Hermione had ventured into the castle. It had been easy enough, the first time she had visited, to collect the Diadem (which had been Avada'd as soon as she had it outside Hogwarts' wards, had joined the Locket and the Ring in a warded, shrunken box, and now lived in her pocket with Diary Tom) and verify that Quirrell was, indeed, possessed. Ronald Weasley, however, had not brought his rat to the common room at any point on either of her two previous visits, and she preferred not to risk the chance that there were wards against non-professorial, adult women entering the Gryffindor boys' dorms to hunt it down. (On the whole, she thought that a dimension-hopping time-traveler from twenty years in the future breaking into a boys' dorm to have a look at a rat sounded somewhat less plausible even than an Azkaban escapee doing the same.)

Thus for the third Saturday in a row, Hermione Granger was sitting in a corner of the Gryffindor Common Room, surrounded by Avoidance and Notice-Me-Not Charms, observing her younger counterpart and that of her oldest friend.

She did not like what she was seeing.

The Young Hermione was every bit as much of a swot as Hermione recalled from her own first and second years. The Ravenclaw prefects and her year-mates had been fairly understanding of this tendency, and even outside of Mary, Lilian, and Aerin, she had had many casual acquaintances, who later became good friends. Here, however, instead of joining in study sessions with her peers and getting tips on how to write better essays or apply her vast knowledge of facts from older housemates, Young Hermione sat alone with her books. Hermione only ever saw her younger counterpart speak to two people: Harry Potter and Ronald Weasley, and even then, their conversations revolved around only two topics: Ronald attempting to badger Young Hermione into helping with the boys' homework, and identifying Nicholas Flamel. She would hardly have called it an acquaintanceship, herself, but at a guess, she would have said that Young Hermione was lonely, and pathetically grateful for even such limited friendship as the boys offered.

She didn't precisely blame Harry and Ronald for being better friends with each other than with Young Hermione – they were, after all, eleven-year-old boys – but neither of them seemed to have any interests at all in Young Hermione as a person. Both their attitude and Young Hermione's apparent obtuseness to the situation irked the time-traveler. The first two years of her Hogwarts experience had, in hindsight, polished off a lot of her own rough edges – with Lilian's encouragement she had toned down the obnoxious hand-waving and nagging for attention, and the close friendship she had had with Mary gave her a sense of security she had never had in primary school, that she was valued for more than her ability to answer all the homework questions correctly, such that she was not nearly so compelled to show off her knowledge at all times. Both of the Slytherin girls had helped her learn to assimilate into Magical Britain, just as Mary did. She worried that without similar positive relationships, her young counterpart would grow up to be terribly unhappy and misunderstood in the house of the lions, not to mention the wider wizarding world.

She looked at Percy Weasley as the ghost of Young Hermione's Christmas Future and winced at the sight.

Even worse than the sight of an extremely isolated Young Hermione, however, was the appearance of Harry Potter. Did none of his classmates, prefects, or teachers see that he wore muggle clothing, three sizes too large, under his robes? That his trainers were coming apart at the seams? Did they not notice that he never spoke of his foster family? Did they not care that he was appallingly ignorant about the magical world and his place in it? If they did, they said nothing. All they seemed to recognize was that he had won them their first Quidditch match of the season (What were they thinking, putting a first-year on the House team?); fought a troll; and was generally living up to their expectations for the Gryffindor Boy Who Lived.

There was a distinct hint of hero-worship in many of his peers' eyes which made her decidedly uncomfortable.

A bit of poking around at the Ministry the week after her first visit to the school revealed that Harry had no personal Magical Guardian – only the Office of Child Welfare – which meant Minerva had never taken him away from his abusive muggle relatives. Hermione, recalling the way Dumbledore had attempted to manipulate Neville's grandmother into forcing him into dangerous situations like the Tournament, had to wonder whether Harry's continued isolation from the magical world was the old goat's fault. He had been the one to place both Mary and Harry with the Dursleys, hidden by the Chief Mugwump in an undisclosed location as a 'national treasure.' She knew he hadn't been pleased about Mary slowly slipping through his fingers over the years, and he hadn't even thought that she was the prophesied savior. If she knew Bumbles (and she liked to think she did, albeit primarily through Snape's stories), he would be clinging tightly to any hold he had over Harry Potter.

And, she thought sardonically, it wouldn't be difficult to maintain such a hold. Harry seemed nearly as isolated as Young Hermione, always sitting only with Ronald, or off at Quidditch practice, though he hardly seemed to talk to the rest of the team when they were in the common room, let alone his yearmates. She never saw him instigate an interaction. Mary had been shy, too, at first, but between Hermione, Lilian and Aerin Moon, Morgana Yaxley, and the Weasley twins, she had at least been on speaking terms with a few people in multiple years in three houses. Ronald, if Hermione recalled correctly, had been friends with Neville Longbottom in her own world, and had been involved in several of the twins' pranks before she started associating with them. Here, though, he seemed content to while away the hours with Harry alone, the two making no effort to make connections within or outside of their House.

It might have been a product of her spending all of her time with Slytherins, but she couldn't help but worry for the three children cutting themselves off from their peers and all the potential resources they could provide. Plus both Harry and Young Hermione seemed to be succumbing to the wizarding world's general prejudice against common sense: neither of them seemed to have thought to simply ask around after Nicholas Flamel. Ronald, who had been raised by wizards, she thought, might be excused, but there was no reason her own younger counterpart should have thought it more efficient to read every book in the library rather than asking for help.

…

Finally, after nearly twenty hours of observation and mulling over the problems of Harry and Young Hermione, Ronald brought his rat down from the boys' dormitory, apparently as an object to test his Color Changing Charm. After perhaps thirty minutes, he succeeded in turning it a hideous shade of orange, after which it was allowed to curl up on the arm of the couch and go to sleep. Hermione cast a Notice-Me-Not on it before following up with an Animagus Revealing Charm.

Had she been visible, the bared teeth of her triumphant grin might have scared more than a few young Gryffindors: sixteen years after her first attempt to capture the wretched creature, Peter Pettigrew was finally within her reach.

A quick Sedation Spell (an advanced, colorless variation of the Stunning Charm) and Summoning Charm later, the Rat was unceremoniously stuffed into a pocket. Hermione followed the Weasley twins as they left the common room, no doubt on their way to prank some poor Slytherin or Hufflepuff, and let herself out of the Castle through the passage which most quickly led to the edge of the Apparition Ward.

}{-}{-}{-}{-}{

10 December, 1991

Two Birds with One Sacrifice

What do you mean, you are destroying the horcruxes?

Exactly that. Voldemort must be destroyed – completely destroyed – and the only way to do that is to destroy his anchors to this world.

You can't! I'm one of them!

I know.

You don't want to murder me – I know you don't!

No, I don't. That's the problem. I want to get you out of this book – break the connection between you and Voldemort, make you swear an Unbreakable Vow not to attempt a violent revolution, and let you have your second chance.

I also don't want to commit murder to do it.

How did my counterpart manage it?

Killed the Basilisk and used its magic to power a ritual he made up on the spot. I couldn't replicate it if I wanted to. And besides, that body only lasted about five years before it started seriously deteriorating.

If we're to break the connection between myself and the Idiot, the problem is the life-spark. What about the vampire ritual?

That requires a human sacrifice, and you know it.

Plus somehow I don't think you'd be up for a lifelong dependency on human blood.

Couldn't be much different than a lifelong dependency on food in general, could it?

Fine, I stand corrected. Creepy bastard.

How did the second reincarnation work?

We still needed a sacrifice, but we used a Kissed Death Eater.

Clever.

Thank you. But there are no convenient victims this time.

Could you not just kidnap some reprehensible criminal?

No. I'll think of something else. I think I'm going to need more time, though. It's less than two weeks until Yule, and I still haven't gotten the Cup or the Scar or you, let alone looked into a ritual to take me back.

I can't believe you just AK'd the others.

They were feral. Definitely non-sentient. And I really want Voldemort dead.

Have you decided what to do with the rat and your convict yet?

I've been looking into the state of things at the ministry and doing a bit of prognostication since I caught the little bit of filth. It looks like there's about a 25% chance that approaching either Amelia Bones or Dumbledore could result in Sirius' name being cleared, but there's a much greater chance that the general corruption of the Ministry and the Wizengamot will result in the trial being botched or thrown out.

Kill the rat to resurrect me; break your prisoner out; transfigure the dead rat to look like the convict; help the convict start a new life in America.

I'll think about it.

What's to think about? It solves both problems at once.

Your plans always seem like good ideas, but they almost always have holes and require improvisation by the end.

And in my experience, improvising tends to be rather hit or miss.

I really don't want to gamble with your life.

Well, I can't say I really disagree with that sentiment. But I am willing to take a risk or two if it means getting out of this damned book.

I'll keep that in mind.

}{-}{-}{-}{-}{

12 December, 1991

"I've come to offer you a choice."

Sirius Black, in the form of Padfoot, whined as he sensed the approach of a Patronus Charm, and painfully forced himself back into his human shape. Even with the Dementors driven away for the moment, this shape reminded him more strongly of his failings. He would rather stay a dog forever than think even once more of how his decisions had destroyed everything. But he couldn't. If anyone found out about Padfoot, they would take him away. He had to hide Padfoot – the dog was his only hope of remaining relatively sane.

A witch approached, with a silver fox snarling silently at the dementors that followed her. She held a cage in one hand, and in it, a rat. The rat, Sirius realized, as she came nearer.

"Hello, Sirius," she said gently, opening the door to his cell and kneeling beside him on the cold stone floor. "My name is Hermione, and I've come to offer you a choice."

}{-}{-}{-}{-}{

17 December, 1991

If Journals Could Pout

Tom, will you stop being such a baby about this? I'm still planning to find a way to free you. I'm just not going to kill someone to do it.

Like binding his magic and leaving him in Azkaban alive was kinder. No. Still not speaking to you.

Whatever gave you the impression I cared about being kind? The simple fact is, I'm not a killer.

Liar.

Just because I have killed before doesn't mean I enjoy it or want to do it again. I've grown up since I was sixteen – enough to realize that there is value in a human life aside from the power it can provide as a ritual sacrifice.

You know what, you don't have to talk back. You can just listen. Like a normal journal.

No.

Too bad. How are you going to stop me?

I hate you.

I introduced Sirius Black to Dr. Wilson today, and Dr. Wilson to Magical Britain – her son is a wizard, and will be attending Hogwarts in a couple of years. I'm sure McGonagall will be pleased to have one less panicking muggle parent on her hands come summer after next. Dr. Wilson specializes in childhood developmental psychology, but she did a decent job with Sirius in my world, so I figure I might as well let her have a crack at him here as well.

It only took about three more hours of scribbled 'chatter' before Tom gave in and decided to speak to her again. He never was very good at giving her the silent treatment.

}{-}{-}{-}{-}{

18 December, 1991

Sometimes You Just Have to Ask Politely

"Head Manager Keystone, my thanks for agreeing to see me," Hermione said, her tongue tripping over the unfamiliar syllables of Gobbledygook. Magical languages – especially speaking them – never had been her strong suit, but for the sake of negotiations, she was willing to make a fool of herself in front of the goblin who was responsible for all of Gringotts' banking business, and therefore also most of their dealings with the wizarding public. She was, so far as Hermione could tell, the closest thing the goblins had to an ambassador.

For nearly six weeks, her letters to Gringott's, requesting an audience regarding the prevention of a breach of the most recent Wizard-Goblin treaty had been bounced up and down the chain of command within the goblin nation, with one respondent telling her to address a higher authority, and then the next dismissing her plea as a waste of time. It appeared, however, that her recent ultimatum (meet to discuss the issue or I will bring in wizard officials, and there will be a formal inquiry – which no one truly wants) had been enough to make her somebody's problem, rather than eternally somebody else's.

"You have been most persistent," the goblin said, her face impassive. Most unfortunately, she refused to switch to English, apparently more interested in watching Hermione struggle to communicate than offended by listening to the human mangling the goblin common-tongue.

The witch soldiered on: "As is known from my missives, I am concerned about a breaking of the truce most recent. Whose fault deciding would for certain lead to war, waste of lives and… resource."

"Billiwig scatterings!" the goblin declared – a phrase, Hermione recalled, roughly equivalent to 'codswollop.' "You accuse Clan Gringotts of harboring a fugitive from wizard justice! We have done nothing of the sort!"

"Not… accuse. I warn that accuse might be made. Please allowing me to explain," she added, noting that several members of the Head Manager's retinue – guards, perhaps, or advisors – had begun to finger the weapons at their sides.

"Granted," the goblin said, in what Hermione could only presume to be a suspicious tone.

"The honorable Head Manager is knowledgeable of the downfall of the Dark Lord who called himself Voldemort, yes?"

The goblin bared her pointed teeth at the name, but said, "Naturally."

Voldemort and his people had been behind the Three Days' Rebellion in 1975. The current ruling faction among the goblins had been opposed to his rise to power long before the Wizengamot began to sit up and take notice of his campaign. Hermione would have been surprised if such a high-ranking goblin had denied such knowledge.

"And also with the belief of the leader of Hogwarts that Voldemort is not truly dead?"

"Everyone knows of Dumbledore's pet theory."

"I regret to inform that Dumbledore is correct. I have information of how Voldemort did not death. He made several horcruxes… soul tie… ships? Jars? I don't know the word in the common tongue…"

The Head Manager looked confused. A male goblin stepped forward, visibly uncomfortable. "Honorable Head Manager," he said with a bow to his superior, "I believe the witch refers to the product of qied tor-serimta ruthiia." The three something ritual.

The Head Manager froze – the goblin expression of fear – and barked something at the subordinate, more quickly than Hermione could catch. The he bowed low in submission, even as he responded to what appeared to be a fierce questioning. The other guards (or advisors) jumped instantly to the alert, drawing blades and forming a protective circle around their leader. Hermione fingered her wand nervously, but refrained from drawing it with the greatest of efforts – to do so would surely see her killed.

After a very tense thirty seconds, the Head Manager turned to her guard. "Stand down," she ordered them. They hesitated. "Now!" As the circle reluctantly parted, she turned her attention back to the witch, finally speaking English. "My advisor informs that you refer to the product of the three-times-corrupted ritual – an object, near impossible to destroy, that holds a piece of the maker's torn attunkiu tsiiu, what wizards call the anima ratio. Is this true?"

"It is, honorable one. In English, that 'product' is called a horcrux. It has come to my attention that a horcrux of Voldemort has come to rest in the Lestrange Family Vault."

A look of suspicion crossed the old goblin's face. "And you ask for access to the treasures of the Lestrange family, in searching for this horcrux? How do we know this is not a clever lie, to steal gold from Gringotts and our clients?"

"Please, honorable one – the horcrux is a cup – small and made of gold, with two handles and an impression of badgers. I propose that a goblin of Gringotts retrieve this treasure and that I be allowed to cast a single spell upon it, here, in the bank, breaking the horcrux, before it is returned to the vault."

"What spell?" the goblin asked, still suspicious.

"The Soul-Stealing Curse," Hermione replied promptly, giving the name the non-human magical beings used to refer to the Killing Curse and ducking her head in humility. "It would break the bond between the soul fragment in the horcrux and the treasure; as the honorable one is no doubt aware, it does nothing else. The treasure would be undiminished in its own value, and the remainder of the criminal Voldemort would be destroyed."

In her own universe, Mary had asked Luna to purge the horcrux in a White Arts ritual, out of concern for the ancient enchantments on the cup, but Hermione and Tom had analyzed it afterward, and she was certain that ripping the soul away from its vessel would have had a similar effect. The remaining enchantments related to the horcrux would unravel and disperse in time without the soul to anchor them, and Hufflepuff's enchantments would be unharmed.

"I will consider your proposal," the Head Manager said dismissively. "Return tomorrow."

Hermione bowed deeply and left the Execution Room – normally used for the reading of wills – through the door she had used to enter. It wasn't an outright 'no.' That the Head Manager was seriously considering her proposal was almost unexpected, though it was, of course, what she had hoped for. She had no plan if they insisted that only a Lestrange could fetch the cup out for her, or that she go to the Ministry after a warrant, which she was loathe to attempt for many reasons. The goblins had nothing to lose, of course, and much to gain in that she would be rooting out a 'fugitive' (and Enemy of Clan Gringotts) which had taken refuge in their territory, but they were notoriously reluctant to allow any witch or wizard to use wand-magic within the Bank and other goblin lands.

…

When Hermione returned, she was led not to one of the formal meeting rooms, but to the area of the bank where human cursebreakers worked. The Head Manager and her advisor were waiting, along with a wizard introduced as the Head Cursebreaker. The three Gringotts officials observed from behind a two-way mirror as she summoned not hatred or rage, but righteous determination that Voldemort must die, and spoke the six syllables of the Killing Curse. The Cup of Helga Hufflepuff glowed briefly green, and when it faded, the Head Cursebreaker verified that the ancient enchantments on the vessel were undamaged before Hermione was courteously escorted from the building again.

}{-}{-}{-}{-}{

20 December, 1991

"That Just Might Work"

What if you arrange to capture Voldemort – bind him to an object like a djinn in a lamp?

That… that just might work. It would certainly solve the dilemma I've been working on – now that the other anchors are gone, if I break the connection between you or the Scar and the Wraith, the Wraith is likely to be drawn to the other, as a horcrux was originally intended to function, and I don't want that to happen to either you or Harry. But if I make him into the equivalent of a horcrux himself…

You're welcome. Let me know when you come up with the necessary spells.

}{-}{-}{-}{-}{