Evangeline Longbottom and the Last Time-Turner
A/N: Just to avoid confusion, this is the Prologue to a novel-length fic. The prologue is set immediately after the Battle at the Ministry, near the end of Harry Potter's fifth year at Hogwarts. The rest of the story, however, is set about 21 years later, years after the defeat of Voldemort. Enjoy!
Prologue
Cornelius Fudge surveyed the damage to his Ministry with dismay. He was standing in the middle of the Atrium, a large gold-paneled, high-ceilinged chamber lined with Floo Network regulated fireplaces. Usually the room was immaculately clean and gleaming, but tonight it looked like a war zone. And in a way, it was. The golden statues from the Fountain of Magical Brethren were scattered on the ground, many missing limbs or sporting nasty dents, and water from the fountain was pooling out onto the once-polished stone floors. The ground underfoot was now littered with broken glass and debris, and the large grey banner that had until recently been emblazoned with Fudge's face was now full of large rips and holes, and looked as though it could come down at any minute. This was going to cost him. But Fudge was too shocked and terrified to think about that yet. He was back. He Who Must Not Be Named was back! Dumbledore and Potter had been telling the truth all along. Fudge had seen the fiend with his very own eyes, not minutes ago! He couldn't get those horrible red eyes and that snaky face out of his head. They'd have his job for this. He didn't know what to do.
While Fudge was freaking out, the rest of the Aurors and other Ministry officials who'd responded to the distress call were milling around the ruined Atrium, seemingly at a loss for what to do. It was Kingsley Shacklebolt who decided to take action. "Minister!" he barked in his smooth, deep voice, and Fudge came out of his reverie with a start. "We must go downstairs to the Department of Mysteries, and find those Death Eaters Dumbledore was on about. We can assess the damage on the way." This sounded like as good a plan as any, so the Minister said, "Kingsley, lead the way. I need a minute." And he swept away in the direction of his office. Kingsley and the others headed for the elevator. "Are there any Unspeakables in this group?" Kingsley inquired, and a few hands went up. "Good, that will come in useful. Let's move." The others followed as the tall, cocoa-skinned Auror stepped into the waiting lift. When the elevator was full, the golden grilles clanged shut. As they made their descent, Unspeakable Quentin Fairwether wondered to himself: what would happen now? If You-Know-Who was really back, the consequences could be devastating, especially for the Minister. Quentin wouldn't be at all surprised if old Cornelius was sacked for this, particularly if the Department of Mysteries had been too badly damaged. He himself was an Unspeakable, and he was terrified that his research, and that of his colleagues, might have fallen into Dark hands in the siege. Just then, another loud clang brought the young wizard out of his reverie as the lift doors opened. The long, black-tiled hallway leading into the bowels of the Department appeared undamaged apart from a few extinguished torches on the walls, and Quentin experienced a few blissful seconds of relief. However, his celebration was short-lived. As they entered the Hall of Doors, he could see large, fiery red X shapes adorning several doors, and one that was even hanging off its hinges. In the Death Chamber, they found the translucent black veil fluttering undamaged in a nonexistent breeze, but the rest of the room was a shambles. Bits of rubble from the battle littered the ground, and at the foot of the veil's dais was a huddle of unconscious Death Eaters, bound together with a silvery enchanted rope. Several of the Aurors broke off from the group to deal with the scoundrels.
While the Aurors took care of the Death Eaters, Fairwether followed Kingsley and the small group of Unspeakables back into the Hall of Doors. From there, they chose another of the X marked doors, which Fairwether knew instinctively was the entrance to the Time Room. Fairwether's father had been a renowned wizarding clockmaker, and had passed along his fascination with clocks and time to his son. Quentin couldn't imagine working anywhere else besides the Time Room, and he felt his blood begin to boil as he laid eyes on the ravaged space behind the door. Many of his coworkers' desks had been overturned, and clocks they'd worked for hours on now lay smashed and broken on the stone floor. Quentin's favorite grandfather clock had a gouge down its wooden front from a spell gone wrong. The bell jar with the bird in it was still intact, thank goodness, but lying nearby it was a grotesque creature. A thick, beefy Death Eater, the man would have been formidable indeed had it not been for his head, small, round and pink, an infant's delicate features on the small face. He must have fallen into the bell jar, thought Quentin with horror as he looked at the large knot on the baby's head. It was out cold. The other Time Wards would be fascinated, especially River and Knockwood, who'd created the bell jar experiment together. Fairwether, however, was mostly just repulsed. He preferred the beauty and sureness of clocks to the actual effects of time's cruelty. Just then, he was brought out of his momentary reverie by the sound of one of the others, shouting.
"Look at the Turners! They're ruined!" A tall, thin Unspeakable with a snub nose and a pompous demeanor was pointing at the glass-fronted cabinet as he called to them. Fairwether vaguely knew the man from one of the other Rooms of Mystery. He followed the man's gaze to the far corner of the room, where they kept the Ministry's stock of Time-Turners in a wooden cabinet with a glass sliding door. To his horror, he saw the cabinet begin to fall, the glass cracking into hundreds of pieces and the wood splintering as it hit the floor. Just when he was about to panic, the cabinet sprang back up to the wall again, fully formed. Before he had time to register his own confusion, the cabinet was broken again. It must have been the Time-Turners. That was the only explanation. "The cabinet must have been broken in the fight, but the Time-Turners kept on working," he said in amazement to the room at large. Kingsley nodded. "Very good. You work down here, boy?" Fairwether nodded. "Know where the notes are on Turners, how to create them?" The young man gulped before replying. "Yes sir, in the office there." He pointed at a small door in the wall next to the damaged grandfather clock. As Quentin's gaze fell to the door, he spotted something glittering on the doorknob. It was a long gold chain, and at the end of it was a small hourglass, encircled by two rings of gold, which were engraved with the symbols he knew all too well. "Look! Another Time-Turner! It survived the crash and flew out of the cabinet!" he said in amazement. Kingsley swiftly grabbed the golden chain from the door handle and handed it to Fairwether.
"Get those papers and meet me in the Hall of Doors," ordered Shacklebolt, and Fairwether rushed to comply. "Tonight was a very close call. We must prevent the other side from getting the secrets of the Ministry. Who knows what havoc they might wreak with the power of time-travel! I am doubling, nay, tripling security for the Department of Mysteries, but we need to hide that Time-Turner information in a safe place, where no Death Eater will ever find it." Fairwether, returning with the notes and following Shacklebolt out into the Hall of Doors, nodded nervously. "Yes, sir, but where is safe enough? Where can we possibly hide this secret, when even the Department of Mysteries is not secure enough to hold it?" Kingsley turned to face the young man, and said gravely the words that Quentin Fairwether had most been dreading. "You know where we must go." The young Unspeakable went quite pale as the Auror handed him the golden box that now held the only Time-Turner left in the world. "You will say nothing of what you are about to see, not to anyone. I trust you can handle that, Unspeakable Fairwether?" Kingsley Shacklebolt said seriously. And with one final, nervous nod from Quentin, Kingsley grabbed the other man's shoulder firmly, and they turned on their heels and vanished with a "Pop!"
Now that the Ministry wizards were gone from the Time Room, an eerie stillness fell over the battle-torn chamber. The only noises were those of the cabinet still breaking, repairing itself, and breaking again- and the barely audible sound of footsteps creeping across the debris-strewn floor.