Author: Clara Fox
Title: Chosen
Summary: Hermione isn't satisfied with the accepted version of Snape's actions on the night of Dumbledore's death. A canon-friendly (at least until book 7!) look at Snape's true intentions through Hermione's eyes. Some H/R, fleeting H/S, lots of angst.
Rating: T for revisiting character death (canon) and some language.
Disclaimer: All the characters and their memories were created by and belong to JK Rowling.

Chapter 1: When She Comes Walking Over
It was a beautiful day. Hermione sat on the lakeshore and hugged her knees to her chest. There was something wrong – something didn't make sense, but she couldn't pin down exactly what it was. This wasn't a novel type of problem for her, but she wasn't used to facing it alone.

Of course there was something wrong about that night, Harry had practically shouted at her when she had tried to enlist his help. The greasy, lying, murdering bastard had killed Dumbledore. Harry had always thought Hermione was supposed to be the smart one.

Ron hadn't been much help either. Since that night they had been on better terms than any time since their second year – maybe ever – but the lull was tenuous. Hermione was wise enough to guess that it could break in only two ways: either they would both have to finally admit, and act on, their feelings for each other, or one of them would say something to ruin it and then the best option available would be constant, disabling awkwardness.

Although the first option was terrifying in its own ways, the second would be disastrous for their ability to work together with Harry over the next year; Hermione had a fleeting vision of her hand and Ron's reaching out to secure the final Horcrux and then both of them recoiling at each other's touch, allowing Snape to grab it for himself while laughing manically. She shook off the ridiculous image and chided herself for giving in to melodrama.

Hermione stood up and began walking along the lake. Harry had refused to help even before he knew what she was getting at, and Ron wouldn't be much help with this even if there were some way they could work together without risking their temporary peace. If Dumbledore were still here, Hermione knew she could have talked to him. But then, if Dumbledore were still here, the problem wouldn't exist.

If only Snape hadn't killed Dumbledore: that was the crux of the issue. If Snape hadn't shown his true colors in such a dramatic and unequivocal way. Was that what bothered Hermione? That Snape, so long a man of shadows and cloaked motivation, had laid everything out there and stood for a moment in the bright light?

Hermione realized with a surge of panic that she didn't believe what Snape had done. It wasn't the disbelief that stems out of betrayal and shock, but her usual, cool logic that told her a piece of the story was missing. Something in Snape's actions didn't fit. He had made a choice that night, but it wasn't to lay bare his loyalties to the Dark Lord – it was to make a show of choosing sides. A show meant to fool everyone but one person. Hermione only fully understood the source of her panic when she realized that that person was her.

Miss Granger, Miss Lovegood: tend to Professor Flitwick – he seems to be taken ill. No, there's no time –

Snape had dashed away down the corridor faster than Hermione had ever seen him go. So why had he stood perfectly still for the several long seconds he spent speaking to them? Hermione had remembered feeling very strange as Snape spun on his heel and hurried off, but the discovery of a stunned Flitwick inside the office had put it out of her mind. Try as she might, Hermione couldn't bring back anything but snatches of feeling - impressions of worry, regret, fear, and a wave of pleading so strong that even the memory of it made Hermione want to fall to her knees. That night, in the very short time between experiencing those emotions and letting the urgency of the fight take precedence, Hermione had chalked them up to the after-effects of taking Felix Felicis. Now, she realized that Snape had been inside her mind.

The worry and fear could just as easily have been in her already, and at some point, Hermione had regretted pretty much every one of her actions of that night. But the pleading hadn't come from her. Snape had been trying to tell her something, only he hadn't had the time and she hadn't had the practice with legilimency to make the message more clearly understood.

A faint hooting and a tiny plume of grey smoke against distant blue mountains told her that the Hogwarts Express would soon be arriving, and Hermione reluctantly left her jumbled thoughts by the shore of the lake and walked back toward the castle to rejoin her two best friends.

The train was quieter and emptier than Hermione had ever seen it. She, Harry, and Ron had a compartment to themselves for the first time in quite a while. They had left Neville and Luna both in the crowd of funeral guests apparating away outside the school gates; theirs and many other parents had opted to side-along apparate their children straight home rather than letting them ride the train, heavily-guarded as it was.

Ginny had declined Hermione's invitation to travel with them, instead heading to the other end of the train with a group of her girl friends, and Hermione realized with a falling heart that Harry had gone through with his Noble Sacrifice, the stupid boy. She wondered if he knew what Ginny was planning, but now was not the time to tip him off to that.

Ron had been sending what he clearly thought were furtive glances at Hermione for the entire half-hour they had been underway. As pleased as she was to have his attention finally, Hermione wasn't ready for that sort of distraction at the moment.

"Ron, if you want my sandwich, you just have to ask."

"Oh, er… I wasn't…" He gave up trying to decide whether or not he was meant to protest that he hadn't been looking at the sandwich, and failed spectacularly to catch the package Hermione had thrown at him. "Ouch!"

"Sandwiches aren't meant to be dangerous, Ron," Harry snorted. "Aren't you supposed to be good at blocking flying objects from hitting things like… your face?"

"It didn't hit my face, I banged my wrist against your giant rock-luggage you've left on the seat. And I'm trained to catch things that are thrown by people who can aim, not things chucked well to the side of me by batty witches."

"Oh, ha ha, Ron. You've found me out: I'm not sporty," Hermione snorted gently, not about to give Ron the extra attention he was clearly fishing for by tenderly rubbing his wrist.

"And I'd appreciate it if you didn't attempt to destroy my possessions, Ronald," said Harry. "Especially since now we have some privacy, I was going to show you what it is."

"That's the package McGonagall gave you just before we left?" asked Hermione.

"Yes, and Ron's nearly spilled it," Harry replied. He began to unwrap the white tissue from around the large object, and both Hermione and Ron gasped when they saw the white light dancing from among the wrappings.

"You got the Pensieve?"

"Dumbledore left it to you, then?"

Harry nodded, and was silent for a moment. Then he said, with some effort, "I guess Dumbledore had… prepared… for something to happen to him. McGonagall said there was a card left by it saying I was to take it, and also my name was on this." He held out a small, partitioned wooden box that looked to be full of tiny crystal vials. "The Pensieve is empty now, but McGonnagall thinks Dumbledore bottled everything else he knew that he hadn't time to tell me. I'm going to go through it all when I'm back on Privet drive – I expect that will be the best way to spend time there while mostly being somewhere else."

"Harry, this is amazing." Hermione spoke softly.

"But didn't Dumbledore say he'd told you everything he knew about the Horcruxes?" asked Ron slowly.

"Yes… well, no, actually. He never told me how to destroy them."

"You know," began Hermione, "some of these bottles are empty. I think you're meant to add your own memories to the Pensieve, Harry. Maybe alongside yours, Dumbledore's will make more sense."

Harry looked thoughtful. "But I already know my memories. And I don't know how to put them in the Pensieve, or get them into the bottles once they're there."

"Putting them in is easy, Harry. You just have to bring up the beginning of the memory and pull at it with your wand. I found some books about pensieves after the first time you told us about them. The real benefit of them is that they let you look at your memories from a new viewpoint, and they let other people look at them. Other people who might notice something you didn't."

"Other people like us!" Ron said excitedly.

Harry paused for only a moment before closing his eyes and lifting his wand to his head. A thin, silvery-white strand clung to the wand tip when he pulled it away. The three of them sat in silence for a few seconds, watching as the strand shuddered a few times before coiling neatly onto the surface of the Pensieve and disappearing in a blinding swirl.

Before the light had subsided, Harry was already pulling another strand from his head. He dropped this one into the Pensieve, and retrieved another, then another. Then he stopped, breathing heavily.

"That should cover what happened that night. You two go ahead and look at them – I don't want to go back to that just now."

Hermione looked at Ron, and together they bent toward the shimmering liquid in the basin. The train compartment seemed to twist on its side as Hermione fell down through darkness tinged with a green light.

They were standing in a cave lit from far away by a green glow…Harry and Dumbledore were crossing the water in a boat… Dumbledore was falling to his knees, begging Harry to stop forcing a potion down his throat… Harry grabbed a heavy locket from a stone basin… flames erupted from Dumbledore's wand… Harry was pleading with Dumbledore to hold up for just a while longer…

Dumbledore waved his wand and Harry went stiff under his cloak… Dumbledore and Malfoy were facing each other on the top of the tower…Three Death Eaters burst through the tower door… Snape was staring into Dumbledore's eyes, a look of deepest revulsion on his face… Snape pointed his wand and a jet of green light burst from it… Dumbledore's body was suspended in the air for an agonizingly long moment before falling gracefully from the tower…

Harry was rushing across the grounds, in pursuit of several dark-robed figures and pursued by two others… Hagrid's hut was bursting into flames… Snape was shouting at his fellow Death Eaters… Snape was shouting at Harry… Harry was on his knees, groping for his wand…

Harry was standing without moving in front of a crumpled figure on the ground…Hagrid was saying something… Harry was examining a small object… The sound of phoenix song rose above the anguished cries of the crowd…