A/n: Please remember the disclaimer in the previous chapter about the logic behind the time travel in this story and don't try too hard to make sense of it. If you're a science person and the illogicality of it bothers you, then just skip past the explanations and read the rest. Happy reading!

Chapter 2: The Decision

Draco studies the two True Time-Turners Hermione has succeeded in creating. Each stands proudly in their respective glass domes atop a short, mahogany bookshelf in the farthest corner of her laboratory that doubles as a study. Both look heavy thanks to every part having been made of the purest form of gold. If you stand at just the right angle where the afternoon light floods in through the far window, you can almost see the magic pulsating around them.

He can see subtle differences in the spells engraved on the rings of each, but besides that, they look near identical, and very similar to the Typical Time-Turners that the Ministry of Magic used to issue. He wants to ask Hermione again what makes the two in the glass domes different than their counterparts but decides against it at the risk of sounding foolish.

The most glaring difference between the two Time-Turners before him, however, is the fact that one is oddly misshapen, as though it crumpled on itself under great pressure, while the other stands proudly in its perfect form. Draco presumes that the misshapen Time-Turner is the one that Hermione used to travel back into the past to save him—a fact that he hasn't quite wrapped his mind around yet but is steadily becoming more and more convinced of being the truth.

The other, uninjured Time-Turner is the one Hermione intends to use to make the second time jump, Draco is sure. His mind wanders back to their previous conversation, where Hermione insisted that the solution to avoiding the creation of an infinite time loop while simultaneously managing to save both past Draco and Harry ('pDraco' and 'pHarry', as Hermione had dubbed them for the sake of clarity) was for the both of them to go back into the past together and save pDraco a moment before Hermione from the time loop (dubbed Hermione2) arrives, thus allowing Hermione2 to save pHarry and fulfil the originally intended purpose of the time jump while also being able to save pDraco.

Draco argued, saying, "If your intention is to simply do what you originally did and save past me—I mean pDraco—before Hermione2 arrives at the scene of the crash, there's no need for me to tag along, is there?"

Hermione sighed and tapped her quill on the large piece of parchment spread out before them that they were using to strategise. "Changing an already-altered reality has never been done before and could lead to consequences that we cannot foresee. The reason you need to be there as well is because, once we re-alter the same past, we will have to forcefully prevent the splitting of our current future from the future that Hermione2 will bring about."

"You mean, we need to prevent the creation of an alternate reality that will be born from us changing an already altered reality," Draco said.

Hermione pointed a finger at him. "Exactly. Because, technically, Hermione2, you, and I all belong to the same timeline. But, if Hermione2 saving pHarry was to create an alternate reality, then Harry will still be dead in our timeline." She gestured between them as she said our.

"And how would we go about preventing that?" Draco asked.

Hermione pursed her lips. "We need to erase ourselves from existing in this timeline."

Draco stared at Hermione like she had completely lost her mind. "You've gone mad," he said, aghast. "You've finally lost it!"

Hermione rolled her eyes. "Think about it for a minute, Draco. If we erase our current selves once we have re-altered the past, while we are still in the past, then Hermione2 will be forced to return back to this exact future and not an alternate reality. Because if you and I no longer exist in this timeline, an alternate reality will not be created and pDraco and Hermione2 will slip back into this timeline and take the places you and I currently occupy. Which means that both Harry and you will continue to exist in this same timeline instead of in an alternate reality to this."

Draco nodded slowly as the logic of it all sunk in. "But what makes you so sure we won't be creating another time loop?"

"We can't create one because we'll cease to exist once the alteration has been made. Time can only loop when something exists that creates and sustains the loop. But if there's nothing there to create the loop to begin with—"

"Then there can't exist an infinite time loop," Draco finished, breathless. "So we'll be putting an end to the previous time loop that you created the first time as well."

Hermione's smile was wry, her brown eyes twinkling in the way they always did when she felt accomplished.

Draco shook his head and sighed. "Hermione Granger, you really and truly are a genius." He ran a hand through his hair. "Although the idea of ceasing to exist is daunting, it wouldn't matter much because we would still exist in this reality—just not the us that went back in time to rewrite the past."

"Exactly."

"But," Draco said, one part of the whole plan still weighing on him, "if Harry is alive in our re-created reality, would you and I still be friends? Would you even create a Time-Turner in the first place? Would we actually be the same people?" His shoulders slumped. "When we cease to exist, wouldn't we be erasing everything that happened to us in the past ten years?"

"But Harry will be alive," Hermione whispered, shaking her head. "The only thing that would change is our tragic futures." She took Draco's face in her hands, and the latter couldn't help but feel unnerved at the way her eyes shone in that same crazed manner as before. "You can live a happy life with whomever you please, free of nightmares and an indescribable survivor's guilt, and I'll still have a happy marriage and live with my kids!"

Draco sighed, still not fully convinced, but the more he thought about it, the more appealing Hermione's plan sounded. He could be… happy? He would choose to erase the past decade for a do-over any day. Hermione had her own reasons for being convinced this would work, it seemed, and Draco wanted to believe in her optimism.

"Alright," he said, nodding. "Let's do it."

Hermione squealed in delight and smacked him on the arm. "Go sort out whatever needs sorting and be back here within the next three hours. We have to do this right away if we want to get the timing right so we have enough time to save pDraco before Hermione2's arrival."

And that brings Draco back to the current moment, three hours later, as he moves around Hermione's work space, scrutinising her belongings but being respectful enough to not touch them. His eyes fall on a family portrait, and he grimaces at the sight of Hermione surrounded by a trio of redheads.

From all that Hermione had told Draco about her marriage to Ron Weasley in their years of friendship, he didn't understand why she wanted to return to being Weasley's wife. While Draco did understand that Harry being alive would mean Weasley and Hermione wouldn't spend the next several years in a toxic co-dependence where they blamed each other for the death of their best friend because they couldn't bear the guilt of it by themselves, he wondered how big a role Harry would play in Hermione's marriage being a happy one.

Draco knew that Hermione would do anything to live with her kids again, though, since the only reason she had lost custody of them in the first place was because she had been down here, in her secret lab. She had lost track of time while in the midst of her time travel experiments, thus leaving the children upstairs in a situation of near neglect. It was just the one time, but it was bad enough that it happened even once, and Hermione regrets it to this day.

Draco did still worry, however, that while Harry being alive would give Hermione the happiness she so desperately desired, it would also mean that she would no longer have any reason to research time travel or work extensively in creating Time-Turners. What this means is that the chances of Draco and Hermione meeting and becoming friends because of their like-minded interests in time travel and the possibility of altering the past would cease to exist. Draco would lose someone he considered one of the only few people that mattered in his life.

But you would have Harry, his mind whispers to him, and the thought of that sends his heart aflutter. Even if he can't remember the reason behind him being together with Harry during that car crash that should have killed them both thanks to Hermione's memory altering charm, Draco most certainly remembers that they shared several moments of genuine affection and passion before that—even if it was for a brief period of time.

And the possibility of getting that back further strengthens his resolve. Just as he prepares himself for the task at hand, the hatch door in the ceiling falls open, and Hermione descends on a rope ladder, all smiles and frizzy hair.

"Ready to go?" she asks as she approaches him.

"As ready as I'll ever be," Draco replies with a nervous laugh.

Hermione smiles and gestures for him to follow her. As they stand before the Time-Turners, Hermione carefully pulls off the domed glass lid and gingerly picks up the functioning Time-Turner. She glances at Draco before putting it around both their necks and says, "Well, let's hope this works."

"I mean," Draco replies as she mutters under her breath and spins the rings. "What could possibly go wrong?"